THE DOINGS 

OF THE 

DOLLIVERS 

GRACE MAC GOWAN COOKE 



STURGIS & WALTON COMPANY 






GopsyrightN? 


COPYRIGHT DEPOSIT 









THE DOINGS OF THE DOLLIVERS 


































“Oh, it was a complicated mess of Dollivers/' 


See p, 50 



THE DOINGS OF THE 
DOLLIVERS 

THE STRANGE ADVENTURES OF A DOLL FAMILY 


BY 


AUTHOR OF 


GRACE MacGOWAN COOKE 

)i 

“SON RILEY RABBIT AND LITTLE GIRL,” “THE WHAT 
HAPPENED THEN STORIES," ETC., ETC. 


WITH ILLUSTRATIONS BY 

HARRY LINNELL 


■Kcw 13 orft 

STURGIS & WALTON 
COMPANY 
1910 

All rights reserved 



Copyright 1910 

By STURGIS & WALTON COMPANY 


Set up and electrotyped. Published October, 1910 


©CI.A275U49 


TO EVERY CHILD WHO 
HAS A DOLL AND 
LOVES IT 


PREFACE 


I wouldn’t for the world have any one think 
that anything in these Dolliver stories is the 
least bit exaggerated. Please, my dear readers, 
understand that there actually were Dollivers, 
that they did live in a little doll-house in the 
nursery (I am afraid that eligible family resi- 
dence of theirs was reconstructed out of a 
washstand, but that’s a detail), and as for their 
adventures and personal characteristics — why, 
at our house we fully believe in every single 
one of them. 

You see the queen of the Dolliver country 
got a sort of rage for subjects; her appetite was 
omnivorous — that long word means that she 
took anything in the way of a doll or toy that 
was what she called, “the right size.” Mr. 
and Mrs. Dolliver’s family tree, one may as 


PREFACE 


well admit, was a Christmas tree — you will find 
that Mrs. Dolliver alludes to that in speaking 
to her husband. With them began the fun; of 
course a Mr. and Mrs. and a house, meant serv- 
ants, family, and as we found afterward, horse, 
cow, garden, and neighbours. Gradually the 
Dollivers drew about them a social circle; they 
created their own world; and that is what very, 
very philosophical people say every man really 
does. 

It was about the time the Which-and-T’other 
twins appeared that the grown-ups began to 
notice and talk about the Dollivers. The family 
that inhabited the two-story washstand in the 
nursery did remarkable things. Truly their be- 
haviour was often so amazing that the only way 
to account for it was to originate the theory that 
they came alive at night, and we felt rather 
proud of ourselves when we got this theory well 
a- working. We found it an ample and satis- 
factory one. It provided unfailing fun and 
interest; and as the small queen is almost as 


PREFACE 


fond of stories as she is of dolls and toys, these 
Dolliver stories grew and throve mightily for 
her pleasure. That they may give as much de- 
light to other children is the hope of 

The Author. 

Carmel-by-the-Sea, 

California, July, 1910. 


' / 


, i: ,1 


\ . ' ' ■[■I 


CONTENTS 


CHAPTER PAGE 

I. Which and T’other 3 

11 . The White Kitten 21 

III. The Spotted Horse 30 

IV. The Knitted Woman 39 

V. The Crumply Horned Cow 45 

VI. The China Dog 53 

VII. Mr. Dolliver’s Stomach 60 

VI 1 1 . Dolly’s Education 78 

IX. The China Pigs 85 

X. The Indians 90 

XI. The Japanese Prince 96 

XII. The Eskimo 103 

XIII. The Dollivers Attend the Circus 112 

XIV. The Joy Ride 120 

XV. The Dirigible Balloon 133 

XVI. Going Up! 142 

XVII. Mrs. Dolliver Cleans House 155 


ILLUSTRATIONS 

From drawings by Harry Linnell 


“Oh, it was a complicated mess of Dollivers” .... Frontispiece 

FACING PAGE 

Mr. and Mrs. Dolliver S ly 

“I am a lame man,” said Mr. Dolliver sadly 26 

One finally climbed upon Mrs. Dolliver’s bed 86 

“Whoop !” yelled Captain Jack 94 

“We shall be pleased to go with you on a trial trip, sir” . . . . 124 

Aunt Dinah and Dolly 154 1/ 


I 




. i 


I * ’ 


‘it 

> > r 


I . 


IV.. 


t •• f 


i . 


t 

I \ 


A \ 


i • 


f i 


I » 


/•' 

r $ 




' • '■ - 


t ' * 


. / s i ^ * • , ,•' ' 

( . I> \ • J ' t . , • ' f' ' 1 

'?)- 1 • •' • •• ’’ ' 

. \ f B* f} r'. 'p. i. ' .-a r ' 


> k 

» 


' ’ ,V 


f ' 


» > 


t 

' I 


I . 


t 

I ' ^ 


% i 

I 


' . 1 


* i 


4 t 


\ : 


\ k 




, /V;. 






' i 


'. / . 




... i 


^ " I . A V 


I 


J 


1 


4 


THE DOINGS OF THE DOLLIVERS 




The Doings of the Dollivers 

I 

WHICH AND t’other 

There was once a dear little girl who had a 
family of dolls, very much like your family of 
dolls, or those of the little girl next door. She 
called them the Dollivers. They had their 
home in a low cupboard with one shelf. This 
shelf made upstairs and downstairs for the 
Dolliver family; and the rooms were divided 
according to the furniture the little girl hap- 
pened to have. 

When we go to sleep, dolls wake up, you 
know, and live their little lives, have their little 
pleasures and their little troubles, as we do ; but 
as this is in the night-time, there is nobody to 
see them or to know it. 

3 


THE DOINGS OF THE DOLLIVERS 


The country the Dollivers lived in was the 
nursery. It was a very flat country, and the 
land was rich or poor, according to the figures 
on the carpet. The faded ones were the poor 
soil; the rich soil was where the colours were 
bright. The nearest running water was the 
wash-stand, away over in the corner of the 
nursery, where, if nurse turned on the faucet, 
there was a raging cataract and a large lake. 
The Dollivers loved to picnic over near this 
natural curiosity. 

The king — or rather the queen — of the coun- 
try in which the Dollivers lived was Ethel, the 
dear little girl who owned them. They loved 
her, but she often did things which distressed 
them dreadfully. 

The Dolliver family consisted, very properly, 
of Mr. and Mrs. Dolliver and their children. 
To begin with the head of the house (again very 
properly) , Mr. Dolliver was a doll about eight 
or ten inches long, whom Ethel’s mother had 
dressed in a suit of brownish grey cashmere. He 
4 


WHICH AND T’OTHER 


always alluded to it carelessly as “my tweeds,” 
and gave the impression that he had a dress suit, 
some black clothes, and other wear. But in 
point of fact, the grey cashmere clothes were as 
far as Mr. Dolliver’s wardrobe had ever gone. 
The masculinity of his appearance was much 
helped out by a cunning little hat, made of 
cardboard, and covered with cashmere like his 
suit. This being rather stiff, had a trick of 
slipping off, and Ethel finally glued it in place. 

“It will be bad for your hair, I suppose, Mr. 
Dolliver,” she said. “My papa says wearing a 
hat too much is what makes so many gentlemen 
bald; but I can’t help that — you’re always drop- 
ping it; and if you don’t like to sleep in it, why, 
you can just stay awake all night.” 

Ethel did not know how true this was, not 
having found out yet about dolls being really 
asleep in the daytime when children play with 
them, and only actually awake at night. 

Mr. Dolliver accepted his hat philosophically, 
as he did most of the things of this life, Mrs. 
5 


THE DOINGS OF THE DOLLIVERS 


Dolliver included. The lady had been decreed 
him by Queen Ethel, not sought and courted; 
yet he gave her a devotion which was beautiful 
to behold; he would, without wrangling or pro- 
test, permit her to wait on him all day long, 
and if there were any hard or disagreeable 
tasks which he did not wish to perform, he 
never interfered with Mrs. Dolliver’s deter- 
mination to be heroic and undertake them. 

This state of affairs was rendered more ap- 
propriate by the fact that Mr. Dolliver was a 
lame man. To tell the truth, his body was 
stuffed with bran, and it had very early in his 
history attracted the attention of a marauding 
mouse. This fierce creature nibbled his ankle, 
and when Ethel found him (scaring away the 
mouse at the same time), a tiny, thin trail of 
bran was oozing out on the shelf beside his 
foot. 

So his little mistress played that he was a 
wounded hero, and she carried him to Nurse 
6 


WHICH AND T’OTHER 


Anna, who was darning stockings over by the 
window, and played that Nurse was a great 
surgeon about to operate on Mr. Dolliver. 
Anna threaded a needle with heavy, white 
thread and operated quite successfully, but she 
sewed up the leg without putting in more bran, 
so it left that member quite flabby and waggly 
— and Mr. Dolliver was lame for life ! 

Ethel sewed a lead pencil to his hand, and 
let him forever after walk with a cane. Of 
course, the cane and hat gave Mr. Dolliver the 
air of being continually about to go out or of 
having just returned from a ramble; but as this 
is quite the proper attitude for the man of the 
house, it was never objected to. 

Mrs. Dolliver was slightly larger than Mr. 
Dolliver; Ethel felt a little sorry about that, 
till after his accident. She used to apologise 
to the gentleman for the height of his wife; 
but from the time the mouse gnawed his ankle, 
she would say, 


7 


THE DOINGS OF THE DOLLIVERS 


“It’s just as well, Mr. Dolliver. She can 
take a great deal better care of you, and she 
needs all her strength and size now.” 

Mrs. Dolliver had a china head, not empty 
as you might suppose, but stuffed with scraps 
of newspaper. Nurse did this with the idea, 
which some old-fashioned people have, that it 
made it less liable to break. These scraps of 
newspaper in Mrs. Dolliver’s head seemed to 
have given her a number of quite unconnected 
and unrelated ideas and opinions. It was not 
her fault; the head was sewed fast to her 
shoulders, and there the scraps of paper were, 
torn by Nurse Anna’s fingers and thumb to 
about inch squares. If Mrs. Dolliver thought 
in inch squares for the rest of her days, and if 
her opinions broke off in the middle of a line, 
who could hold her responsible 
She wore a striped lawn dress. Tied over 
that was a white apron, and sewed in her arm 
was an infant doll with a nursing bottle such 
as may be purchased already prepared at most 
8 



I 


. and Mrs. Dolliver. 






WHICH AND T’OTHER 


of the toy shops. This sewing of the baby into 
Mrs. Dolliver’s arm was, to the lady’s thinking, 
a more serious matter than the stuffing of her 
head. The baby not only got in the way of 
most of the things she wished to do — or wished 
not to do — but it somehow penetrated and per- 
meated Mrs. Dolliver’s disposition, so that you 
never quite got Mrs. Dolliver herself — it was 
always Mrs. Dolliver and the baby, you see. 

The rest of the family, before the twins came, 
consisted of Dolly Dolliver, a really delightful 
little French doll, graceful, arch, with more 
practical common sense behind her dimples and 
long lashes than all the rest of the family; and 
Tommy Dolliver, a boy doll in a blue-and-white 
sailor suit. He was the oldest son of Mr. and 
Mrs. Dolliver, and he was born a sailor boy — 
he came ready-dressed, you know, in a sailor 
suit. Mrs. Dolliver did not want him to be a 
sailor. She was very much afraid of the water 
(and so was he) ; she said it had washed all the 
paint off every doll’s face that she ever saw go 
9 


THE DOINGS OF THE DOLLIVERS 


about it. But poor Tommy Dolliver could not 
help himself; he came into the world a sailor, 
and a sailor he would have to remain, unless 
Ethel chose to make him some new clothes. 

In the kitchen was Aunt Dinah, a black bisque 
doll with a gay turban on her head and a spotted 
calico frock on her plump body. Aunt Dinah 
cooked for the Dolliver family on the perfectly 
practical looking tin range, and rattled the pots 
and pans about at a great rate when she was 
getting the meals. 

But the loudest and liveliest portion of the 
Dolliver family, if not the most important, was 
the twins. And this is how the twins came 
about : One day, as she was coming home from 
kindergarten, Ethel met her young uncle. She 
was very fond of Uncle Harry, and I think my- 
self that a boy uncle is one of the most delight- 
ful things life can offer a small girl. This one 
promptly gave his niece a bright, shiny, silver 
dime; and as she was near to the Five-and-Ten- 
10 


WHICH AND T’OTHER 


Cent Store, she went promptly in to invest in 
more dolls. 

Down to the five-cent counter she trotted, and 
looked it over very seriously. There was one 
tray which had some dolls nearly four inches 
long, with furry hair at the top of the hard, 
spare-looking jointed bodies. They wore a sin- 
gle white garment with a strip of red cloth 
around the middle to serve as a sash, and this 
frock — or shirt, as one chose to regard it — was 
fastened by a small tack driven directly into 
the spine between the shoulder blades. (Ethel 
afterwards played that the head of this tack 
was a button, and you may do so very nicely if 
you get a doll which is inconsiderately dressed 
in this way.) 

“I’ll take two of these,” Ethel said at last, 
indicating these bodies with a plump forefinger. 

“Two of them — for yourself*?” asked the 
young woman behind the counter. “Why, 
they’re just exactly alike, dearie. You won’t 
11 


THE DOINGS OF THE DOLLIVERS 


know which from t’other.” And she smiled a 
very sparkling sort of smile. 

“Oh, yes, I shall,” Ethel assured her, gravely, 
examining the dolls for some little mark which 
she alone could see. “This one is Which, and 
that one is T’other.” 

The little girl was not at all sure as to why 
the saleswoman laughed so, or what it was she 
told to another person behind the counter there ; 
but the words stuck in her mind all the way 
home, and worried her a bit. She was to stop 
at Grandma’s for the afternoon, and it was 
growing dusk when she reached home. She had 
had her dinner, and Mamma was promising to 
read a delightful new story book; so Ethel 
merely opened the door of the Dolliver house 
and tossed the little packet in with the remark, 

“There are some more children for you, Mrs. 
Dolliver. They’re twins, and their names are 
Which and T’other.” 

Then she went on into Mamma’s room, and, in 
the darkness, the nursery was very still for a 
12 


WHICH AND T’OTHER 


while. The first thing that stirred in it was the 
bundle Ethel had bought; this crackled like a 
dry leaf as the hard little legs of the twins 
kicked free of it. First one scrambled out and 
looked about him with funny china eyes, then 
the other. Mrs. Dolliver was just beginning to 
realise that she could now move about and at- 
tend to the new purchase, when she heard a ter- 
rific shouting. 

“I’m Which,” came a squeaky little voice. 

“I’m T’other,” answered another, so like it 
that nobody in the world could have told which 
from t’other, quite as the young lady in the store 
had said. 

“Oh, dear!” groaned Mrs. Dolliver. “Wake 
up, Mr. Dolliver — this is one of the times when 
you have to give me the support of your firm, 
manly character. — You’ve got one, haven’t 
you^ Didn’t you hear what Queen Ethel said*? 
Now, do you hear what the twins themselves are 
saying*?” 

“Yes — yes,” agreed Mr. Dolliver quite ami- 
13 


THE DOINGS OF THE DOLLIVERS 

ably, blinking at his wife as though he found 
himself something of a marvel in the way of 
understanding. “I heard both of those things, 
my dear, — all three, I should say. My hearing 
is excellent. It was my leg that was injured — 
,you have got things a little mixed — which, after 
all, is not to be wondered at under the circum- 
stances. No doubt you are excited.’’ 

“Excited!” echoed Mrs. Dolliver, with a sort 
of moan. “Who wouldn’t be^ I always heard 
it was perfectly terrible to have twins, but I 
never dreamed it was anything like this.” 

“Did you ever dream about it at allT’ asked 
Mr. Dolliver, in that patient voice of his which 
always made Mrs. Dolliver want to scream. 
“Now, tell me the truth, love, did you ever 
dream about this particular happening Why 
should you^” 

When Mr. Dolliver got onto this track, his 
wife prudently gave up before she began, and 
returned to an earlier stage of the conversa- 
tion. 


14 


WHICH AND T’OTHER 


“Excited!” she repeated his former expression. 
“Excited — the word is tame!” 

“Oh, yes, my dear — I assure you, quite tame 
and gentle. You may use it — or ab-use it in 
any way you see fit, and it will never turn upon 
you.” 

“Hush,” said Mrs. Dolliver. “Listen!” 

Up-stairs and down, all through the Dolliver 
house, there was a pattering, clattering racket 
as of a Waterbury watch run mad — the twins 
chasing each other over their new abode to see 
how they liked it. 

“I’m Which,” one yelled. 

“I’m T’other,” his mate shouted back like an 
echo. 

“We’re twins,” they howled in concert. 

“We’ve come here to be your twins,” one of 
them said, but nobody could have told which 
one it was. 

“This is the mother doll,” chirped one of the 
little wretches, drawing up in front of the hor- 
rified and exasperated Mrs. Dolliver. 

15 


THE DOINGS OF THE DOLLIVERS 


“You mustn’t call me a doll — it is a bad 
word,” Mrs. Dolliver told them in hasty par- 
enthesis. “I’ll spank you for saying bad words 
— at least, I would if I could get the baby un- 
sewed from my arm.” 

“This is the father doll,” squeaked the other, 
popping up at Mr. Dolliver’s knee, and paying 
no attention to the caution which had been ad- 
dressed to his brother. 

“Didn’t you hear what your mother said*?” in- 
quired Mr. Dolliver in a tone which was meant 
to be quite fierce. “I haven’t got any baby 
sewed into my arm; but I’ve got a cane sewed 
— or rather clutched — in my strong right hand, 
and I shall cane either one of you children which 
does not attend strictly to what its mother says 
— do you understand T’ 

Mr. Dolliver always said, “Do you under- 
stand*?” very grandly. The twins stood and 
stared quite a while. Then, they answered in a 
most curious fashion, scrambling at the words to- 
gether, and one saying part of the sentence while 
i6 


WHICH AND T’OTHER 


the other finished out. It was a little like a 
couple of puppies or kittens playing with a shoe 
and snatching it back and forth from mouth to 
mouth. 

“Yes, we understand,” they replied in this 
curious fashion. “You’ve got a cane sewed 
onto your hand — but it isn’t a real cane — it’s 
nothing but a lead-pencil.” 

Mr. Dolliver looked very dignified. He had 
not yet learned that looking dignified at the 
twins was scarcely worth while. 

“It’s a great convenience,” he said gravely, 
“that pencil cane. Few gentlemen have the 
same.” And there he spoke the truth. 

“Gracious !” exclaimed a musical little voice at 
the doorway, and all the dolls turned to see 
Dolly Dolliver standing there, dimples in her 
pink cheeks, her eyes very bright. “Ma’s got 
twins — and such awfully cheap, common look- 
ing ones — I don’t believe they ever cost more 
than a nickel apiece.” 

“Don’t reproach them with their humble 

17 


THE DOINGS OF THE DOLLIVERS 


origin, my daughter,” said Mrs. Dolliver, using 
her best maternal manner. “In the fostering 
atmosphere of this home they will, no doubt, 
grow up to be noble men and women — as I hope 
you all will.” 

She wound up rather lamely, because Dolly 
had begun to giggle. 

“How many men and women do you suppose 
those two creatures will grow up to be^” the 
eldest child of the Dolliver family inquired. 
“Besides, they’re both supposed to be boys, I 
should say, in spite of those ridiculous little 
frocks they’ve got on.” 

Which and T’other turned and regarded their 
nice big sister hopefully. Here was sensible 
talk. They ran and flung themselves upon her, 
and she received them good-humouredly, if not 
with enthusiasm. 

“Won’t you make us some boy clothes — real 
boy pants?” they howled. “We don’t like to 
look so girly. We think we’re old enough for 
pants.” 


WHICH AND T’OTHER 


“No — no,” chuckled Dolly — and that was a 
“no” for each one of the twins. “Queen Ethel 
may do that some time, if you’re very good; but 
generally she lets us stay the same age, and 
that’s one of the advantages of toyland — you 
don’t have to grow up. You just be good little 
boys, and don’t torment mother.” 

Dinah was in the kitchen getting breakfast 
(you must remember that night is morning with 
the dolls) when tl>i^ twins rushed shrieking in 
and through. 

“I’m Which,” shouted one. 

“I’m T’other,” shrieked the next one. And 
so they went all over the house. 

“Which — T’other ! T’other — Which !” it 
echoed from end to end of the Dolliver man- 
sion. 

“Oh,” sighed Mrs. Dolliver, “here is the end 
of peace, I fear.” 

“The end, my dear,” Mr. Dolliver checked 
her, “which end?” 

For once, Mrs. Dolliver was ready for him. 

19 


THE DOINGS OF THE DOLLIVERS 


'‘1 said the end — not the beginning/’ she 
snapped, and ran hastily up-stairs to investigate 
the meaning of a terrible crash and shriek which 
sounded from one of the upper rooms. 


20 


II 


THE WHITE KITTEN 

When we say ‘"day,” or “morning,” you must 
always understand that the doll’s day begins 
when your day ends, and your midnight is their 
noon. Well, one evening the Dolliver family 
had the paper doll to tea with them. The paper 
doll lived over in Ethel’s desk, and she had an 
elegant summer home in the table drawer. In- 
deed she was a most elegant sort of person, with 
poor health, which proved that she must be very 
superior indeed. She was so frail that she did 
not dare go near the water for fear of getting 
wet, and the slightest excitement made her 
rustle and flutter like a dry leaf. 

Mrs. Dolliver had made things as fine as pos- 
sible to entertain the paper doll. In addition 
to the china dishes, with the china food fas- 
21 


THE DOINGS OF THE DOLLIVERS 


tened to them, she had a little lump of cheese 
and a bit of cracker which were left over from 
Ethel’s tea party. The Dollivers and the paper 
doll were all sitting around the table being as 
elegant as they could — considering that Mr. 
Dolliver was a lame man, with a hat and cane 
firmly attached to him, and Mrs. Dolliver had 
the baby sewed into her arm, and Which and 
T’other never would behave anyhow — when they 
heard a little squeaking and a little rustling, and 
in came slipping a mouse, and hopped up on the 
table. 

Now of course a mouse looked about as big 
to the Dolliver family as a very large kangaroo 
would look to you or me. And since the dread- 
ful, dreadful time when a mouse gnawed Mr. 
Dolliver’s leg and made him a lame man, he 
fainted if anybody merely said “mouse” — and 
he didn’t even like to hear of other things that 
began with M. 

The mouse had been attracted by the smell of 
the cheese. He paid no attention to the Dol- 
22 


THE WHITE KITTEN 


liver family-^he thought they were “just dolls, 
anyhow/’ Mr. Dolliver fainted, as I told you 
he was sure to do, and fell under the table. 

Mrs. Dolliver rose up, with the baby sewed 
into her arm, and shrieked, “My husband ! He 
will be killed again!” 

Of course nobody can ever be killed again. If 
a person — even a doll — has been killed once, 
that settles it. Indeed, nobody had ever heard 
till that minute that Mr. Dolliver had been 
killed once; but Mrs. Dolliver was very much 
excited, and then she had the baby sewed into 
her arm, and that interfered with her doing any- 
thing but shriek. 

At first. Which and T’other had thought that 
the mouse was going to be great fun; but when 
they heard their mother shrieking thus, they de- 
cided they were frightened — and Which and 
T’other were perfectly terrific when they were 
frightened. 

Tommy Dolliver picked up the china dish with 
the china roast chicken on it, and was for throw- 
23 


THE DOINGS OF THE DOLLIVERS 


ing it at the mouse; but his mother cried out: 

‘‘Do not madden him! I am certain that we 
shall all be killed before he leaves this house — 
but do not madden him, my son !” 

Down on the hearth rug in front of the fire, 
there lived a white kitten. Mr. Dolliver’s dis- 
like for mice extended to cats; for he understood 
that cats had something to do with mice. So he 
wanted all his family to keep away from the 
white kitten, as he considered it “a roaring, 
ravening wild beast.’’ 

Then one day (a sure enough day when Ethel 
was in the room and the dolls could only move 
as she moved them) the white kitten got hold 
of Tommy Dolliver and played with him. It 
dragged him all around over the floor, and 
nearly tore his clothes off of him. None of the 
Dolliver family, except Dolly Dolliver, would 
ever have thought of going near the white kitten 
for anything. As soon as the mouse made its 
appearance in the Dolliver dining-room, Dolly 
hopped up from the table, skipped down to 

24 


THE WHITE KITTEN 


the hearth rug. She bent over the kitten where 
it lay asleep — and blew in its ear! 

This made the white kitten sneeze. Then he 
looked around and said, 

“Why, it’s a little girl! No, it.fsn’t — it’s a 
little doll! No, it isn’t — it’s a little girl-doll!” 

“Well, you got it right at last,” Dolly Dol- 
liver said. “Please come up to our house ; there’s 
a mouse up there. Don’t kittens catch mice*?” 

Don’t kittens catch mice! Dolly was almost 
frightened at the fierce look that came into the 
white kitten’s eyes when she said, “Mouse.” 

“Come along,” he purred, jumping up. 
“Come along quick! Prrr! — mice!” And he 
ran after Dolly, switching his tail. 

When they got to the Dolliver house, the 
mouse had eaten the cheese and gone. 

“Never mind,” said the white kitten, “he’ll 
come back and hunt around to see if he can find 
anything more. You must all sit down, and let 
me hide behind the corner of the house.” 

Everything happened as the white kitten had 

25 


THE DOINGS OF THE DOLLIVERS 


said. The mouse did come stealing back to hunt 
for crumbs. Then, when he was on the table 
with his long, co-o-old tail dangling down and 
tickling poor Mrs. Dolliver’s toes, the white kit- 
ten gave a spring. He knocked Mrs. Dolliver 
over, and the mere wind of his going blew the 
paper doll clear across the room; but nobody 
cared for that. For there was a pounce, and a 
rattle and a ‘'squee — squee — squee!’’ and the 
white kitten walked off, growling, with the 
mouse in its mouth, that long co-o-old tail trail- 
ing miserably on the ground. 

The roast chicken platter had been knocked 
off the table, and the chicken was broken right 
through its breast bone. Nurse said in the morn- 
ing that there must have been a mouse in the doll 
house, which was drawn there by the cheese that 
Ethel left, and that the white kitten must have 
caught it. She called Ethel a very careless lit- 
tle girl; but never guessed how eventful that 
cheese had made things for the Dollivers. 

26 



“Whoop!” yelled Captain Jack 




M 


“I am a lame man, 


said Mr. Dolliver sadly 





THE WHITE KITTEN 


When the fainting Mr. Dolliver had been 
dragged from under the table and some water 
poured in his face, he opened his eyes and sat 
up. They told him about the mouse and the 
white kitten. He looked over to the hearth rug, 
to where the kitten lay — it had eaten the mouse 
by this time, and was feeling pretty comfortable, 
thank you. 

“I am a lame man,’’ said Mr. Dolliver, sadly. 
“For that reason, some people may doubt my 
courage. I have called the white kitten a raving, 
ravening wild beast; but I am brave enough to 
go and apologise to it and thank it for saving my 
other foot, if not my life.” 

“Mr. Dolliver,” said Mrs. Dolliver, “it is true 
that you are a lame man. It is also true that I 
have the baby sewed into my arm, and that 
hampers me a little. But you shall not go alone. 
If you go — I go.” 

And Mrs. Dolliver looked so heroic that all 
the Dolliver family shed tears. Well, all but 

27 


THE DOINGS OF THE DOLLIVERS 


Dolly Dolliver; and she had been over to visit 
the white kitten, and didn’t see what they were 
making such a fuss about. 

The whole Dolliver family and the paper doll 
announced an intention of going with Mr. Dol- 
liver; so they set off in a procession. First came 
Mr. Dolliver, leaning on his cane, because he was 
a lame man. Next came Mrs. Dolliver, carry- 
ing the baby, because the baby was sewed into 
her arm. Next came Aunt Dinah, dreadfully 
frightened, with a piece of catnip in her hand 
to try to please the white kitten. After her was 
the paper doll, rustling and fluttering and 
blowing back every few steps. T ommy Dolliver 
and Which and T’other brought up the rear ; they 
were behind all the others, and they were boys, 
anyhow, and were not so much frightened. 

Mr. Dolliver had a speech all ready which 
began, “My noble preserver,” and ended with 
something about “the eternal gratitude of all my 
family.” 

But what do you think they found that white 
28 


THE WHITE KITTEN 


kitten doing? He and Dolly Dolliver had 
struck up a great friendship; so the little doll 
was riding about on the kitten’s back, very much 
as the lady with the short fluffy skirts does on the 
flat back of the fat white horse in the circus. 

Mr. Dolliver would make his speech — because 
he had it ready. (And what use would that 
have been if he hadn’t made it?) But nobody 
listened to it much; for Tommy and Which and 
T’other all flew to that white kitten and climbed 
up its sides and hung to its tail, and had the 
merriest, merriest romp, all over the hearth-rug, 
that was ever seen. 

It made the white kitten sneeze to be called 
“a noble preserver” — perhaps sneezing is a cat’s 
way of laughing — and he told Mr. Dolliver that 
he thought he was a pretty good mouse pre- 
server, and that any time the Dolliver family 
had any mice to be preserved he should be glad 
to be called in. 


29 


Ill 


THE SPOTTED HORSE 

You must remember that Mr. Dolliver was a 
lame man — it was an awful thing that a mouse 
should have nibbled his foot because he was 
stuffed with bran, and made him lame for life. 
Well, then, Mr. Dolliver was a lame man and 
had to limp about leaning on his pencil cane; 
and the ambition of his life was to have a horse 
to ride. 

He was born with a penny in his pocket — dolls 
are born grown-up, you know, and dressed, too, 
for that matter. One day Tommy Dolliver 
found a penny on the nursery floor and carried 
it home. Maybe sometime when your pennies 
disappear, and you wonder where they have 
gone, some of the dolls have carried them off just 
this way. 


30 


THE SPOTTED HORSE 


Mr. Dolliver thought that perhaps for two 
pennies he could buy him a horse. There was a 
man on the mantel — I really forgot to tell you 
about the mantel ; it was a sort of high cliff that 
overhung all the nursery country, and on it 
lived some very aristocratic people. There was 
this gentleman who owned the horse and was 
made of bisque. I could never begin to tell you 
how beautifully this gentleman was dressed, in 
blue knee-breeches and a flowered waistcoat 
and a three-cornered hat. Nor could I describe 
the clothing of his wife, who stood on the other 
end of the mantel and smiled at him all day 
long. But alas and alas! one day, while she 
was dusting, the housemaid broke the wife, and 
the pieces were thrown away. 

Near the bisque man stood the spotted horse, 
a noble animal, who was all pale grey with tiny 
black polka dots on him, and a stubby mane 
which stuck, up, and a stubby tail which stuck 
out. 

Mr. Dolliver, though he was a lame man, 

31 


THE DOINGS OF THE DOLLIVERS 

managed to climb the mantel one night with the 
two pennies in his pocket, and asked the bisque 
man if he would sell his horse. 

“No indeed,” said the bisque man, “not for 
two pennies. He’s three pennies or nothing. 
Why that horse cost a dime in the open market, 
not a year ago. , i wouldn’t sell him, even for 
three pennies, ohly that I have no use for him.” 

All this made poor lame Mr. Dolliver very 
sad. 

“I have but two pennies,” he said ; “and being 
a lame man I have no way of earning more.” 

“Look in his mouth,” said the bisque man. 
“You’ll find he’s worth the money.” 

Mr. Dolliver did not wish to look in the 
spotted horse’s mouth. He was afraid it might 
bite him. But then he did not wish to say this, 
because he was afraid the bisque man would 
laugh at him. So, as the spotted horse had his 
mouth obligingly open — he was born that way — 
Mr. Dolliver looked in and saw that it was 
painted inside with the very best red paint. 

32 


THE SPOTTED HORSE 


That certainly did settle it. Mr. Dolliver 
wanted the horse worse than ever. But he had 
only two pennies, and the bisque man insisted 
that he would not take less than three; so Mr. 
Dolliver went sadly home. 

When he got home he found a man there with 
a mule to sell. Mr. Dolliver said that he did 
not want a mule — he had always heard they were 
treacherous creatures; still, if the man wished to 
sell the mule for two pennies, and it was a good 
riding animal, Mr. Dolliver thought he would 
try it. 

The man looked extremely doubtful about 
this. He was a knitted man, and the beads 
which made his eyes had slipped in toward his 
nose, which made him a little cross-eyed and 
gave him a very doubtful expression anyhow. 

“That there mule is worth more than any two 
pennies,” he said. “He’s got three good legs, 
and the other one isn’t broke off very high up. 
I think he ought to be worth a penny a leg — call 
it three pennies and we’ll trade.” 

33 


THE DOINGS OF THE DOLLIVERS 

The Dollivers were all standing out in front 
of the house, Mrs. Dolliver at the head of the 
line, with the baby sewed into her arm. Aunt 
Dinah next. Tommy Dolliver next, and Which 
and T’other jumping around almost anywhere. 
Dolly Dolliver was gone. 

“Why, yes,” began Mr. Dolliver, hopefully, 
“if that' s all, I can call it three pennies, easily, 
and we will immediately trade, as you say.” 

But Mrs. Dolliver was thinking about the 
horse’s legs, and now she suddenly screamed, 

“Oh, Mr. Dolliver — pray, pray remember that 
you are a lame man! Do not then buy a lame 
mule also. Who ever heard of riding a mule 
with one leg broken off, anyhow 

The knitted man was very indignant. 

“Riding him!” he shoXited. “Well, I should 
say not. You don’t ride mules. You keep 
candy in ’em.” 

Mr. Dolliver here attempted to get up on the 
mule’s back, “to try its gaits,” he said. But as 
34 


THE SPOTTED HORSE 


he took hold of its mane and jumped, the mule’s 
head fell off and the mule fell over — the mule 
and Mr. Dolliver all in a heap. 

Mrs. Dolliver shrieked and ran to her spouse, 
with the baby sewed into her arm. Which and 
T’other yelled and hurried to look if the mule 
was filled with candy as the knitted man had 
said. T ommy Dolliver helped his f ather up, and 
the knitted man sourly picked up his mule’s head 
and put it on again. 

“I don’t care for an animal like that. He falls 
to pieces,” Mr. Dolliver said. “He’s vicious — 
did you see him throw me*?” 

“He ain’t vicious, neither,” the knitted man 
asserted, angrily. “Just you fill him up with 
candy, and he’s as sweet-tempered a mule as any 
person need want. Him a throwin’ anybody! 
The idee! He’s got one leg broke off, and if 
you push him around that way he falls over — 
that’s all. If his head didn’t come off how could 
you ever get the candy in^” 

35 


THE DOINGS OF THE DOLLIVERS 


Mr. Dolliver was sitting on the ground feeling 
all over his arms and legs to see if any of his 
bones were broken. 

“Take it away,” he commanded. “Take the 
vicious brute away. I have quite enough trouble 
to keep my family filled with candy, without 
buying mules to fill. What I want is a good 
horse to ride.” 

“Oh! to ride, is itf’ the knitted man sneered. 
“What some people will expect! You don’t 
ride mules — everybody knows that. They are 
made to hold candy.” And he sullenly led his 
mule away. 

You are wondering where Dolly Dolliver was 
all this time. Well, she had gone over to talk 
to the bisque man about the spotted horse. The 
first thing she said to the bisque man was : 

“Dear me, how dusty it is up here.” 

“Yes,” answered the bisque man mournfully, 
“it’s very dusty up here now. My dear wife 
used to keep things as clean as a new pin; but 

36 


THE SPOTTED HORSE 


now that she is gone there’s dust everywhere, 
and I lead a sad life.” 

“Would you like to have somebody come every 
morning and dust your mantel?” Dolly asked 
him. 

The bisque man almost shed tears; he said it 
was the ambition of his life to have that mantel 
properly dusted and things kept tidy for him in 
his old age. 

Then Dolly told him that she would dust 
the mantel for a year if he would sell her father 
the spotted horse for two pennies. She had the 
pennies with her, the bisque man promptly 
agreed, and Dolly was soon mounted on the 
horse, careering gaily home and shouting to all 
the Dollivers to come out and see. 

They didn’t need to come out. They were 
all where the knitted man and the mule had 
left them; and you may be sure they welcomed 
Dolly very gladly. 

Mr. Dolliver got up on the spotted horse and 

37 


THE DOINGS OF THE DOLLIVERS 

rode, using his cane for a riding whip. He 
pranced back and forth in front of the house, to 
the joy of all beholders. He called the atten- 
tion of his family to the wonderful way in which 
he could control his fiery steed — but, as even 
little Dolly could ride the horse home, they were 
not so much surprised as he expected they would 
be. 


38 


IV 

THE KNITTED WOMAN 

The knitted woman came to the Dolliver 
house selling lace. Mrs. Dolliver said that she 
must be a Syrian woman, because she looked so 
strange and dark, and talked in such an odd, 
broken way. 

The knitted woman said at once that she 
wanted to sleep. 

“I shleeby. I vair — vair shleeby. I vand to 
shleeb. Let me lie down.” 

That is exactly the way she said it. 

And poor, unsuspecting Mrs. Dolliver took 
her to the bedroom and let her lie down upon 
the bed. Mrs. Dolliver said afterward that she 
would not have done it, only that the poor wom- 
an’s head was almost off, just hanging by a 
thread or two, so that when she moved it it 
39 


THE DOINGS OF THE DOLLIVERS 


would drop over and hang down her back. Mrs. 
Dolliver found this so very distressing to look 
at that she showed the knitted woman into the 
bedroom and told her to lie down. 

Then Dolly Dolliver came home with some of 
her little friends from school; and Which and 
T’other, the twins, fell in the rain barrel — not 
one on top of the other, but one after the other; 
and Tommy Dolliver cut his finger; and the ba- 
by got choked on its bottle; and Aunt Dinah 
let the meat burn in the oven so that it smelled 
all over the house. These were some of the 
things that kept Mrs. Dolliver from remember- 
ing the knitted woman, up in the bedroom 
*'shleebing.” 

When she did remember her, she ran upstairs 
as fast as she could — but the knitted woman 
was gone. So were the comb and brush, and Mr. 
Dolliver’s toothbrush. This toothbrush was 
nearly as long as his arm, and of course he 
couldn’t use it; but he was extremely proud of 
owning a toothbrush. In a sense it set him apart 
40 


THE KNITTED WOMAN 


from other dolls. Dolly Dolliver’s Sunday 
dress was gone also, and Tommy Dolliver’s base- 
ball and bat, and Which and T’other’s little cart 
that they would have loved to wheel the baby 
about in, if Mrs. Dolliver’s arm could have been 
unsewed from around it. 

Mrs. Dolliver noticed that these things were 
all gone — and she didn’t know how many more 
— before she ran shrieking downstairs. What 
she shrieked was: 

‘Tire! Fire!” 

Of course the Dolliver family could not be ex- 
pected to know exactly what had happened from 
hearing Mrs. Dolliver shriek “Fire!” When 
they did come to understand it, Mr. Dolliver 
said that, although he was a lame man, he would 
go and seek out the robber; he would forthwith 
mount the spotted horse, and ride. Mrs. Dolli- 
ver said that she would go with him, only that 
she had the baby sewed into her arm, and she 
didn’t think the baby should be brought among 
such low and vicious associates at its early age. 

41 


THE DOINGS OF THE DOLLIVERS 


Tommy Dolliver was for going and getting 
the white kitten to hunt up the knitted woman. 
Which and T’other simply shrieked and said that 
if they had their cart they would go, and no old 
Syrian woman would get away from them, 

Dolly Dolliver, who was always the sensible 
member of the family, said she didn’t believe 
that it was a Syrian woman at all; if she was a 
knitted woman, that was pretty good evidence 
that she was the knitted man’s wife. The knit- 
ted man was the person who had attempted to 
sell Mr. Dolliver the hollow mule with the brok- 
en leg, that was made to hold candy. Dolly said 
that she knew where the knitted man lived. It 
was over on a table where Nurse kept needles 
and pins — indeed she sometimes stuck needles 
and pins into the knitted man. 

“And serve him right, too!” growled Mr. 
Dolliver. 

So the Dolliver family set off, as they nearly 
always did when there was anything to be done, 
in a procession. First went Mr. Dolliver lean- 
42 


THE KNITTED WOMAN 


ing on his cane. Next came Mrs. Dolliver with 
the baby sewed into her arm. After her was 
Aunt Dinah, who hadn’t stopped to take the 
meat out of the range, but was just letting it 
burn to a cinder. After Aunt Dinah were Dolly 
and Tommy and the twins, all talking, all tell- 
ing exactly what ought to be done — the knitted 
man thought a mob had come to take him out 
and hang him ! 

The Dollivers were almost glad, after all, that 
this had happened. They had never been on the 
table before ; and there they made the acquaint- 
ance of several charming people. For one thing, 
nurse’s button box was open and they met the 
Button family — Mr. Button and Mrs. Button 
and Button aunts and uncles, grandmothers and 
grandfathers, and dozens of Button children, 
little and big. What fun the Dolliver children 
did have rolling the young Buttons around 
(rolling is a button’s way of running) . 

The Button family told the Dollivers that the 
knitted woman had indeed come home with quite 
43 


THE DOINGS OF THE DOLLIVERS 


a lot of stuff in a little cart. She and the knitted 
man were shut up in the work-box, and it re- 
quired the strength of the entire Dolliver family 
to pry open the lid. When they had done so 
they plunged in upon the knitted man and his 
wife, and after saying a great many hard things 
took back all their goods. 

In the morning Nurse said that either Ethel 
had been into her sewing things, or the white 
kitten had climbed on the table. She scolded a 
good deal — Nurse never scolded unkindly, but 
she seemed to like to keep a piece of scolding on 
hand, so as to have something going. She said 
that the way her buttons were mixed up and 
thrown around was scandalous. 

Some time when Mamma tells you that her 
thread is tangled, her scissors and her buttons 
all scattered about, you ask her if she doesn’t 
think the buttons themselves have been playing 
— or possibly the dolls have been playing with 
them! 


44 


V 


THE CRUMPLY-HORNED COW 

After the twins came to live at the Dolliver 
house, Mrs. Dolliver declared that she must have 
a cow. Mr. Dolliver was all for taking milk 
from the milkman (there was one, a tin man, 
with a tin waggon and a tin horse, who often 
drove rattling past the Dolliver house early in 
the morning) . 

Mrs. Dolliver insisted that it would be more 
home-like to have a cow. The one which the 
Dollivers finally bought, was a crumply-horned 
plaster cow, on a little platform with four wheels 
under it. Mr. Dolliver bought her from some 
persons who lived in a small cubby-hole or cave 
on one side of the nursery. Nurse said the 
broken toys were all put there ; but the crumply- 

45 


THE DOINGS OF THE DOLLIVERS 


horned cow was not broken; I think she had 
simply never been a favourite. 

The Dollivers went (as usual) all together to 
bring her home; that is, they all went except 
Dolly Dolliver and Tommy Dolliver, who were 
away on the mantel, working for the bisque man. 
When they got the crumply-horned cow out into 
the open, Mr. Dolliver mounted the spotted 
horse, and Which and T’other ran hooting after 
her. 

No cow that was ever made of plaster could 
have stood the frightful noise with any com- 
posure whatever. When the crumply-horned 
cow shook her head and jangled her bell, with a 
low mutter like summer thunder, Mr. Dolliver 
decided it was just her natural ferocity. 

Mrs. Dolliver shrieked and ran; she had the 
baby sewed into her arm, and she didn’t know 
but maybe that was the way the cow roared just 
before it was going to eat a baby for lunch. So 
she scrambled up behind Mr. Dolliver on the 
46 


THE CRUMPLY-HORNED COW 


spotted horse — which promptly ran away, for 
the first and last time in its history. 

The crumply-horned cow turned and charged 
on Which and T’other. 

The Dolliver family said afterward that this 
was because their dresses were red. The man 
from whom the cow was bought also said that if 
he had thought for a moment that she would be 
hard to drive, he would have put a rope on her 
horns. 

She now rushed upon Which and T’other, 
scooped Which up on her horns and tossed him. 
He turned one somersault in the air and lit upon 
her back. There he sat howling : 

“Oh, T’other, this is great! Get up here, and 
we’ll have a ride!” 

Poor T’other seemed to have no choice in the 
matter. The cow butted squarely into him, got 
him on her one crumpled horn, and tossed him 
after his brother. 

Then came the question of guiding the mad- 

47 


THE DOINGS OF THE DOLLIVERS 


dened animal, who seemed determined to return 
to her cave home. Mrs. Dolliver saved the sit- 
uation here — Mr. Dolliver would never have 
thought of it. “Ride around between her and 
the closet door, Mr. Dolliver!’’ she cried. “If 
you can turn her, we will get home in safety.” 

When Bossy saw the frantically shouting Mr. 
Dolliver and the frantically waving Mrs. Dolli- 
ver, she stopped, shook her head, turned sadly, 
and carried Which and T’other home at a gentle 
amble, keeping always a little ahead of the 
spotted horse. 

You think the troubles of the Dolliver family 
with their cow are now over, perhaps. Far, far 
from it. They had only well begun. 

Shortly before the cow-buying and cow-bring- 
ing-home episode, little Ethel had decided that 
Mr. Dolliver would look more manly if he 
learned to smoke. She made a very natural 
looking cigar, by threading a round scarlet bead 
on a silk thread, then drawing her needle through 
a long, brown bead, which looked like a cigar of 
48 


THE CRUMPLY-HORNED COW 


the size for Mr. Dolliver, and sewing them to the 
corner of Mr. Dolliver’s mouth. She drew the 
thread so tight, that the cigar stood out in a very 
life-like manner; the little red bead looked like 
a glowing spark upon the end of it; and Mr. 
Dolliver was extremely proud of his new accom- 
plishment. 

When they got the crumply-horned cow home, 
the next thing was to milk her, and then, as 
Mr. Dolliver said, to “drink the foamy, creamy 
beverage.” 

Mrs. Dolliver brought out a little tin pail. It 
was larger than a thimble, but smaller than the 
smallest tumbler. It had been in the Dolliver 
kitchen for a long time, and they had as yet 
found no use for it. Then Mr. Dolliver de- 
clared that it was a man’s place to milk the cow, 
and he demanded a milking-stool. Which ran 
and got the piano stool, while T’other offered to 
bring the clothes-line, to tie the cow so his father 
could milk in safety. But Mr. Dolliver scorned 
such timidity. 


49 


THE DOINGS OF THE DOLLIVERS 


“She is a gentle and a noble animal,” he said. 
“Now that she knows what we wish of her, there 
will be no trouble.” 

Indeed, the plaster cow stood quite still on her 
little green platform with the four wheels under 
it, and scarcely looked around when Mr. Dolliver 
set his piano stool down beside her, placed his 
pail between his knees, and leaned forward to 
draw the foamy, creamy streams. 

Now, Mr. Dolliver’s cigar was sewed into his 
mouth, just as the baby was sewed into Mrs. 
DolliveFs arm, so that it could not be removed. 
As he leaned forward it came in direct contact 
with the cow’s side. She stood it a moment, then 
as the fiery red-glass bead burned into her hide, 
she gave one wild bellow, tossed up her heels 
and her horns, and rushed madly away in the 
direction of home. 

One wheel of her platform, as it whirled out, 
raked Mr. Dolliver off the stool, and laid him 
sprawling in the dust. The same motion threw 

50 


THE CRUMPLY-HORNED COW 


the milk pail over his head, so that when he 
presently sat up, he was wearing the pail, like 
some new-fangled kind of tin helmet. 

Mrs. Dolliver (with the baby sewed into her 
arm) had been standing directly behind her hus- 
band, so that his downfall was her downfall — 
and of course her downfall was the downfall of 
the baby. Aunt Dinah had been on the other 
side, holding anxiously to the crumply-horned 
cow’s tail, so that it should not get in the way 
of the foamy, creamy streams. Which and 
T’other were right in the pathway of the 
crumply-horned destroyer. She paused but a 
moment for each, scooped them up, one after the 
other, and tossed them with so much vigour that 
they landed far back of her, one on Aunt Dinah, 
and the other plump upon his prostrate parents. 
Oh, it was a complicated mess of Dollivers, very 
bumped, very astonished, very angry! 

Then the crumply-horned cow went on home ! 
And when Dolly Dolliver and Tommy Dolliver 

51 


THE DOINGS OF THE DOLLIVERS 


arrived on the scene, the owner of the cow had 
also arrived, and was arguing loudly with Mr. 
Dolliver. 

“You’re a pretty man,” he said, ‘‘going about 
burning holes in poor dumb brutes with lighted 
cigars! You say she kicked? Well, I guess 
you’d kick, too, if someone jabbed the lighted 
end of a cigar into your side, and held it there 
till it burned a hole in your skin !” 


52 


VI 


THE CHINA DOG 

You know Mr. Dolliver was a lame man. It 
sounded very much better to just say that he was 
a great hunter, and leave people to guess that 
he might have got his foot shot when he was out 
hunting, than to admit that it had been gnawed 
by a mouse ; so that was what Mr. Dolliver and 
all Mr. Dolliver’s family always said. They 
had once owned a brown canton-flannel poodle 
with worsted ears, and a white canton-flannel 
puppy. And so people got to regarding Mr. 
Dolliver as quite a sportsman, and they always 
asked him questions about anything concerning 
sporting matters. 

When the new china dog was set upon the 
nursery mantel, everybody asked Mr. Dolliver 
what breed of dog he was, and whether he was of 

53 


THE DOINGS OF THE DOLLIVERS 


any account. Dolly Dolliver said that he was a 
china dog, and she was dusting the mantel and 
ought to know. But Mr. Dolliver said that a 
china dog was a breed of dog that he had never 
heard of. He was inclined to the opinion that 
this new dog was a setter, because he seemed to 
be sitting down all the time. 

One midnight (which is mid-day, and dinner- 
time, with dolls, you know) the china dog got 
down olf the mantel, and came across to the 
Dolliver house to get some bones. Mrs. Dolli- 
ver tried to explain to him that their food was all 
china food, and fast to the plates, so that there 
never was, and never would be, and never could 
be, any bones. But the poor dog merely howled ; 
and she finally took a piece of candy away from 
the twins. Which and T’other, and fed it to him. 

This pleased the dog, but made Which and 
T’other very angry, and they decided to run 
away. They ran away over in the corner of the 
room where the picnic place was. They shinned 
54 


THE CHINA DOG 


up the leg of the washstand, and climbed to the 
edge of the basin. There they stood for one 
dreadful, dizzy moment. 

Then Which said, “I dare you.’’ 

And T’other said : 

“I dare youy 

In Which jumped. Of course T’other jumped 
right in after him — neither of them could take a 
dare. Then they began screaming : 

“Oh, we’ll drown — we’ll drown — we’ll 

drown!” 

“It’s awful to drown in soapy water!” poor 
little Which howled. 

“The soap’s all in my eyes!” T’other moaned. 

Now the Dolliver family heard this dread- 
ful clatter, and they came out of their house, 
poor Mr. Dolliver (who was a lame man) lead- 
ing. After him came Mrs. Dolliver, with the 
baby sewed into her arm, so that she couldn’t go 
very fast. Then followed Dolly Dolliver, trip- 
ping along and laughing, and seeming to think 

55 


THE DOINGS OF THE DOLLIVERS 


it all quite funny. Next was Tommy Dolliver; 
and after him, Dinah the cook, who vowed as she 
waddled : 

“Dem chillen is shore de no-countest, triflin- 
est humans dat anybody ever saw. An’ dey 
ought to drown — dat dey ought! An’ den we- 
all could have some peace.” 

After them came the paper doll, rustling 
and fluttering like a dry leaf blown in the 
wind. 

“Oh, my gracious! Isn’t it awful?” she said. 
“Water — think of that! If they’re like my 
family, they’ll simply melt. Our family have 
such melting dispositions, anyhow. We always 
melt in water, and just go to pieces.” 

Up above, the twins could be heard shriek- 
ing: 

“Oh, Whichey, are you drowning?’* 

“Yes, T’other, I’m a-drowning — a-drowning 
— a-drowning! Oh, won’t Pa and Ma feel 
bad?” 

“Serve ’em right for the way they treated us 

56 


THE CHINA DOG 


— feeding our candy to an old dog. Oh, 
Whichey, are you ’bout dead?” 

“Yes, T’other, I’m dyin’ — dyin’ — dyin’ !” 

It was wonderful to see how Mr. Dolliver, al- 
though a lame man, and with a cane in one hand, 
did shin up that washstand leg. It was amazing 
to behold how Mrs. Dolliver, with the baby 
sewed into her arm, climbed up after him. They 
stood, one on each side of the basin. They 
could see Which and T’other’s heads, bobbing 
about in the soapy water. The twins were 
squealing every minute that if somebody didn’t 
come to save them they would drown. 

“Mr. Dolliver,” said Mrs. Dolliver, “pray — 
pray remember that you are a lame man. Do 
not jump into the water, for then I should be a 
widow, as well as twinless.” 

“My dear,” said Mr. Dolliver, “pray — pray 
remember that you have the baby sewed into your 
arm. Do not jump into the water, for then I 
should not only be a widower, but you would 
drown the baby.” 


57 


THE DOINGS OF THE DOLLIVERS 

Then Mrs. Dolliver clasped her hands (though 
it wasn’t at all easy to do, with one of them 
sewed fast around the baby) and said, 

“My children! My children will drown! 

Help! Help! Help!” 

And Mr. Dolliver, on his side of the basin, 
clasped his hands (and it was still harder for 
him to do it, with his cane fastened to one 
of them) and cried out, 

“My children! My children! They will 

drown. Help! Help! Help!” 

And now from below there came a great clat- 
tering — the china dog was coming up the wash- 
stand leg. He flew past Mrs. Dolliver, almost 
upsetting her, jumped into the water and pulled 
Which out. Then he jumped back in and pulled 
out T’other. 

The twins lay on the washstand pretending 
to be almost dead ; but the china dog shook him- 
self (and spattered drops on everyone when he 
did so) , and said, crossly : 

“You miserable little frauds! There wasn’t 

58 


THE CHINA DOG 


an inch of water in the bottom of that basin! 
You were scrooching down to try to make believe 
you were drowning. There was hardly enough 
soapsuds to cover you !” 

“Sure!” cried Which jumping up. “We 
couldn’t have had any fun at all, if we hadn’t 
scared the folks and made them come a-run- 
nin’.” 

“Sure!” squeaked T’other jumping up, (he 
and Which always said the same things) . “We 
made ’em come, didn’t we, Which?” 

But Mrs. Dolliver insisted on calling the 
china dog her “children’s preserver,” and 
“noble animal.” She took him home and fed 
him everything that she could find in the house 
that he was willing to eat, and he soon became 
a great friend of the Dolliver family. 


59 


VII 

MR. DOLLIVER’s stomach 

“My dear, do you know what is the matter 
with us and our family^” 

Mr. Dolliver was sitting in front of the house 
with his lame leg up on a chair, smoking the nice 
little bead cigar which Queen Ethel had stitched 
to his mouth. Mrs. Dolliver reclined not far 
away, with the baby in her arm — though it was 
sewed there, yet she took a good deal of credit 
for never neglecting the infant. 

“What’s the matter with us and our family^” 
Mrs. Dolliver repeated. “Why — er — I think 
it’s measles, with Tommy,” she suggested 
thoughtfully. “He looks very measly around the 
neck where Queen Ethel tied that red cord. It’s 
growing pains in Dolly’s case. I’m sure. She 
6o 


MR. DOLLIVER’S STOMACH 


creaks whenever you set her down. Which and 
T’other seem well, though the paper doll said 
that original sin was what ailed them. I felt 
glad that she considered it original. I should 
never want my children to be copying anybody 
in that sort of thing.” 

Mr. Dolliver blew a long trail of smoke from 
his bead cigar and looked extremely wise. 

“What ails the Dolliver family,” he began in 
that voice Mrs. Dolliver recognised as the one 
he kept by him for the expression of special wis- 
dom, “what ails the Dolliver family — and many 
another family in this broad land,” (Mrs. Dol- 
liver looked hastily around the nursery and then 
back at her husband’s face) “is stomach. We all 
have stomachs.” 

Mrs. Dolliver laid a hand somewhat anxiously 
on the portion of her anatomy under discussion, 
then felt that location upon the baby, and 
nodded in agreement. She believed that there 
were stomachs in both places. 

6l 


THE DOINGS OF THE DOLLIVERS 


“We all have stomachs — man is a stomach,” 
pronounced Mr. Dolliver. 

“Oh — well,” remonstrated Mrs. Dolliver, 
“man may be a stomach, (though really my dear, 
you look like something quite different from my 
notion of a stomach) but I am sure that women 
and children are several other things besides.” 

“A figure of speech, my love, a figure of 
speech,” rejoined Mr. Dolliver in his most 
patronising tone, pretending to take the bead 
cigar out of his mouth, and hold it between his 
first and second fingers, waving them grandly in 
the air as he loved to do. 

Mrs. Dolliver eyed.her husband’s legs for some 
time, and wondered whether he meant anything 
about his figure being the shape of a stomach; 
but finding herself unable to express the query 
in exact words, she remained silent. 

“Man is a stomach,” Mr. Dolliver repeated 
importantly. “And he does not put into him- 
self what a stomach should contain.” 

62 


MR. DOLLIVER’S STOMACH 


“That may be very true,” Mrs. Dolliver said 
eagerly, “if you’ll extend your meaning to take 
in small boys. I’m sure Which and T’other 
make me quite miserable by eating nicks out of 
the plates, instead of sticking to the food that is 
on the dishes. When I tell them it is ruinous 
to the china, they say that they like the flavour 
better.” 

“Ruinous to the china, Mrs. Dolliver — ruin- 
ous to the china. Madam !” ejaculated her spouse, 
rising in wrath. “Have you no feeling for your 
own offspring? It’s death and destruction to 
their digestion.” 

“Oh!” shrieked Mrs. Dolliver, getting up in 
her turn, and looking wildly about for the twins. 
“I didn’t even know they had the digestion. If 
they’ve got that^ they’ll have to be put to bed 
this minute, and hot things laid to their feet — 
or is it to their heads? I wonder if a mustard 
foot-bath would help any? The last time I got 
one ready. T’other drank half of it, and then 

63 


THE DOINGS OF THE DOLLIVERS 


tipped the rest out fighting with Which. I wish 
Nurse was here to help me!’’ 

The nurse to whom Mrs. Dolliver alluded was 
a late arrival in the nursery doll-house. Up- 
stairs, Queen Ethel had a dear little new baby 
brother, and there had come to stay for a time, 
in the house with Ethel’s mamma and the baby, 
a lady with a big white apron belted about her 
trim waist and a pretty small cap on her shin- 
ing, smooth, fair hair. She was a very pleas- 
ant, smiling person, this trained nurse; and when 
her patients were both asleep, she would tell 
Ethel stories, and had brought a nice, fair-haired 
dolly, and dressed it in a little uniform exactly 
like her own. Ethel was wild with delight, and 
the dolls received the new-comer, when she was 
introduced into their home, with scarcely less 
enthusiasm. 

The trained-nurse doll was full of wisdom; 
she knew the lore of the hospital. While Mrs. 
Dolliver was busy with her children and her 
64 


MR. DOLLIVER’S STOMACH 


household cares, the nurse sat on the front steps 
and told Mr. Dolliver surprising things about 
microbes and germs, and what you must eat, and 
when, and why ; but mostly, and at great length, 
what you must not eat, and when not, and why 
not. These remarks of his upon the stomach 
were the first fruits of that information. 

Around the corner of the house came the twins, 
helter-skelter, the china dog, who followed them, 
running in great bounds fully three inches long. 
They drew up in front of their parents and eyed 
them suspiciously. 

“What are you two talking about inquired 
Which. 

“We want to know,” supplied T’other. 

“We were speaking, my sons,” said Mr. 
Dolliver smoothly, “of diet. You are both 
young, yet I trust you understand the word 
‘diet.’ ” 

“Diet,” echoed Which. “That’s something 
to eat, ain’t it?” 

65 


THE DOINGS OF THE DOLLIVERS 


“No,” put in T’other, dolefully, for once dif- 
fering from his twin. “No, it’s something to not 
eat.” 

Mr. Dolliver beamed impartially upon his 
twin sons, and as he was a smooth china doll, 
he could beam very nicely indeed. 

“I had thought,” he opened out majestically, 
“of sending you over to the knitted family who 
live in the work-box, to see if I could not obtain 
from them some proper breakfast food. Your 
mother speaks to me of your eating the dishes — 
nibbling them in fact. This is not as it should 
be. You are not hens.” 

“Wish’t we was,” twittered Which blithely. 
“Gee — wouldn’t we wake you in the morning 
crowing.” 

“Hens don’t crow,” corrected Mrs. Dolliver. 
“At least, proper hens don’t.” 

“We wouldn’t be proper hens then,” jeered 
Which, teetering from one foot to the other, 
and looking at the scandalised pair from the 
corners of his little blue-glass eyes with such 
66 


MR. DOLLIVER’S STOMACH 


an abandonment of juvenile villainy as was 
quite shocking. 

“You are not chickens,” amended Mr. Dolli- 
ver severely, “and you should not eat broken 
dishes, for you have no gizzards.” 

“Wish’t we had,” chirruped T’other. “Then 
we could go round picking up things off the 
gravel walk, like dis — and dis — and dis,” and 
he imitated an ecstatic broiler, much to his 
mother’s bewilderment. 

“Stop that!” Mr. Dolliver spoke quite peev- 
ishly, and not at all with the dignity he had in- 
tended; but when one’s son is navigating about 
on two toes and a nose, somewhat in the manner 
of a hen with its head off, there is hardly time 
to delay for dignity. 

T’other sat up and grinned. 

“I want you boys to take the milk bucket — we 
don’t need it any more since we shall no longer 
keep the cow — and go to Worktable Hill for 
that breakfast food,” their father ordered. 

“But,” Mrs. Dolliver objected plaintively, 

67 


THE DOINGS OF THE DOLLIVERS 


“I thought you said yesterday — and I told Aunt 
Dinah so — that we were to have no more break- 
fasts/’ 

“Did I mention breakfast^” inquired Mr. Dol- 
liver in a rather awful tone. “Breakfast food 
is the article I am sending for. It is a whole- 
some — ah — er — um — preparation, which may be 
healthfully partaken of any time of day.” 

“And what makes you think that the knitted 
people will have it for sale?” inquired Mrs. 
Dolliver anxiously. 

“The knitted woman is now filling the posi- 
tion of pin-cushion for Nurse Anna,” explained 
Mr. Dolliver loftily. “That gives her a right 
to do what she pleases with the old cushion 
which was shaped like a tomato, and filled with 
— well, some people might call it sawdust; I 
prefer to regard it as breakfast food.” And he 
looked severely around upon the members of his 
family there present. 

“Oh,” said Mrs. Dolliver, quite as though 
somebody had pinched her. “There’s always 
68 


MR. DOLLIVER’S STOMACH 


stray needles in that saw — breakfast food — that 
comes out of pin-cushions. Suppose some of us 
swallowed a needle, along with the breakfast 
food. Wouldn’t it — wouldn’t it — 

“It might be too high in proteids for you,” 
allowed Mr. Dolliver. “There — there, my dear 
— that joke is quite beyond you, I fear. But I 
mustn’t forget to tell it to the trained nurse. 
She’ll enjoy it — high in proteids!” And he 
chuckled. 

“But the needles,” Mrs. Dolliver returned to 
the question. “However that knitted person 
may thrive on them, I am sure they would dis- 
agree with my children.” 

“Needles,” echoed Mr. Dolliver, “I’ve tried 
to keep my eye on that point — ” 

“But you couldn’t?’ interrupted Mrs. Dolli- 
ver. “Eye on the point — eye on — . Why, the 
eye is at one end, and the point is at the other. 
You can’t — ” 

“Peace, woman,” said Mr. Dolliver, “you do 
not take my meaning.” 

69 


THE DOINGS OF THE DOLLIVERS 


“I didn’t intend to take it,” Mrs. Dolliver 
defended herself. ‘Tve an excellent one of my 
own. And we’re not to use milk any more — at 
all?” she marvelled, as Which and T’other trot- 
ted away swinging the milk-pail between them. 
*'1 thought yesterday you were going to put us 
all on a milk diet, and give us pearly complex- 
ions, like this dear babe.” 

‘'My dear,” returned Mr. Dolliver, frowning 
heavily, “a wife who wishes to retain her hus- 
band’s entire and untarnished affection should 
never remind him of what he said yesterday. 
Said yesterday, indeed ! Milk is a poison.” 

Mrs. Dolliver jumped. 

“What about the baby?” she shrieked. 

Mr. Dolliver waved a pacific hand. 

* “Milk is his natural diet,” he admitted patron- 
isingly. “On milk he can thrive; but for the 
rest of mankind it nourishes, beneath a pallid 
countenance of hypocritical innocence, poison 
germs of the most virulent sort. Unless you put 
these into it,” and he placed in the hands of his 
70 


MR. DOLLIVER’S STOMACH 


astonished wife, a half-dozen small, pearl shirt- 
buttons, ''and make of it the life-giving, youth- 
prolonging Doebert, milk will poison you.’’ 
Again he frowned heavily, and nodded at her 
two or three times, then added as an after- 
thought. "It will poison you — or me, either.” 

Meantime, the twins, failing to find the 
knitted woman at home, had frolicked gaily 
away on enterprises of their own, Which wear- 
ing the tin milk-bucket on his head as a helmet. 
T’other intermittently pounded on it to try to 
get it away, a process that nearly deafened 
Which, but appeared to give T’other, the hardy 
young buccaneer, great joy. Pushing on from 
Worktable Hill, they fearlessly made it further 
than any member of the Dolliver family had 
ever been. They penetrated even to Window- 
curtain Grove where a mad jungle of vegetation 
of the cretonne variety ran half-way up the sash 
and ended in a brass rod and rings. 

"Whichey!” cried T’other, with a final re- 
sounding thump on the milk-pail. "Take that 

71 


THE DOINGS OF THE DOLLIVERS 


thing off your head, and let’s get us some cu- 
cumbers. Whoop — come on! let’s gather some 
diet for Pa — there’s plenty of it here.” 

For more than an hour those devoted infants 
climbed and tugged, pulled and tore, gathering 
fruits of which they knew not even the name, 
fearlessly biting into pomegranates and lo- 
quats, berries, and balls of all hues and forms. 

The pail was filled to overflowing — and the 
boys were in the same condition — when they 
thought of turning their steps homeward. 

‘‘Oh, I’m so tired!” gasped Which. 

“Me, too,” agreed T’other. “Wish’t I had 
the spotted horse here to ride on,” and he lifted 
one leg heavily after the other. 

“Wish’t you did,” agreed Which heartily, 
“so’s I could take it away from you.” 

“I’m most dead,” moaned T’other feebly. 

“So’m I,” whined Which. “And Pa’ll say it 
was the diet we’ve et, and want to give us medi- 
cine.” 

“Ma’ll say it’s the original sin, and want to 

72 


MR. DOLLIVER’S STOMACH 


give us a spanking/’ howled T’other. And with 
this sort of lamentation they made their way 
slowly home. 

Their apprehensions proved but too well 
grounded. The twins reached home stiff, glassy- 
eyed, on the edge of cholera morbus. 

“What have you two been doing?” inquired 
Mr. Dolliver. 

“Eating up some diet,” returned Which. 

“An’ we brought a whole lot of diet home in 
a pail for you and Ma and the kids,” added 
T’other. Whereupon they were indeed dosed 
and chastised and put to bed. Then Mr. Dolli- 
ver set to work to examine the contents of the 
milk-pail. 

“I’ll see what poison those two unfortunate 
young creatures have taken into their systems,” 
he observed solemnly, raising a juicy cretonne 
plum to his lips. 

He sucked at it so long that Tommy Dolliver, 
lying on the lounge, began to look envious. 

“Is it very bad. Pop?” he inquired. 

73 


THE DOINGS OF THE DOLLIVERS 


“Bad for young persons, I should say,” re- 
joined Mr. Dolliver judicially, as he finished the 
plum, and smacked his lips. Then reaching 
further down in the pail he found a luscious, 
golden pear. This he devoured without any 
formula in regard to finding if it were poison- 
ous. 

“A fruit diet is often indicated,” he said 
largely, as he wiped his chin with the handker- 
chief Queen Ethel had provided him. “It is 
often indicated for the — ah — brain worker. I 
believe those strawberries will need a little 
sugar, my dear. Is there any in the house? 
Sugar itself is a noble brain food — a noble brain 
food. Of course, where foolish children partake 
of it to excess, in candies and such like, it ruins 
the digestion and rots the teeth. But in moder- 
ation, thus” — he piled the powder Mrs. Dolli- 
ver brought in a little bowl onto his plate of 
cretonne strawberries till they were quite 
smothered in white — “partaken of thus, I im- 
74 


MR. DOLLIVER’S STOMACH 


agine it to be highly salutary — for a brain 
worker.” 

“See here!” cried Dolly Dolliver, looking 
over his shoulder. “You aren’t leaving anything 
for the rest of the family, Pa. Tommy, don’t 
you want to come with me over to the Window- 
curtain Grove and get some brain food?” and 
catching up the bucket she ran laughing out, 
followed closely by her brother. 

“My dear,” whispered Mr. Dolliver, clasping 
his hands over his brown cashmere waistcoat, 
“I feel very queer in my — in my — ” 

“Stomach,” supplied Mrs. Dolliver rather 
snappishly. “I should think you would, con- 
sidering all that stuff you’ve been eating — and 
between meals, too!” 

“My love — my love,” remonstrated her hus- 
band weakly, “a fruit diet — brain worker, you 
know — ow!” and he bowed over and groaned. 

“Brain worker,” echoed the lady, “Well you’d 
better work your brain to show you not to eat 

75 


THE DOINGS OF THE DOLLIVERS 


seven different kinds of things — so fast — when 
you’re not in the least hungry. Of course, it 
would give you stomach-ache.” 

“Dear me,” mourned Mr. Dolliver. “And 
you knew this all the time*? No trained nurse 
to tell you, no instructive books to read — you 
just knew it. What an extraordinary woman!” 

“Not in the least,” sniffed Mrs. Dolliver. 
“Who do you suppose has been attending to the 
eating of this family since you came off the 
Christmas tree and I from Queen Ethel’s stock- 
ing on the same bright morn*?” 

“You have, my dear,” responded Mr. Dolliver 
meekly. “And now I wish you would attend to 
the — ah — lamentable effects of a misjudged diet 
on my part, if you can. Oh! Ah-hh! Ow-ooh!” 

“Certainly,” agreed Mrs. Dolliver, with much 
cheerfulness. “You got me confused talking 
about man being a stomach, and calling things 
to eat ‘diet.’ I can doctor a stomach-ache from 
over-eating — if that’s all. Come, you must have 
76 


MR. DOLLIVER’S STOMACH 


a mustard plaster outside and something hot in- 
side. You’ll soon feel better.” 

And Mr. Dolliver was led away tottering, 
groaning, and for once doing just as he was told. 


77 


VIII 

dolly’s education 


Mrs. Dolliver was very ambitious for her chil- 
dren. I know you have often heard that ex- 
pression. It means that parents want their 
children to learn a great many things which 
they, themselves, do not know. Mrs. Dolliver 
loved her children dearly, and she was fond of 
saying that she was ambitious for them, but she 
knew so very little that she hardly knew what to 
be ambitious for. 

“I heard Queen Ethel say once — or perhaps 
she was reading it out of a book — that an educa- 
tion was teaching a person to express himself. 
I should like Dolly to have an education.” 

“But how can you express yourself^” objected 
Mr. Dolliver, whose only idea of the matter was 
the little tin expressman Ethel sometimes 

78 


DOLLY’S EDUCATION 


wound up and set walking past the Dolliver 
house. “And where would she express herself 
to? And then would she express herself back 
again? There’s an important point. We don’t 
want to lose her altogether. Dear me, it 
would be dreadful if Dolly, or any of the chil- 
dren, got in the habit of expressing themselves 
around promiscuously — besides, the express- 
man’s cart is not large enough to hold them.” 

“One thing is certain,” said Mrs. Dolliver, 
“If we are really ambitious for our children, an 
education is the first thing to give them.” 

Mr. Dolliver looked a little doubtful about 
that. 

“I never knew any educated person,” he said, 
“but an educated pig that Queen Ethel’s cousin 
Billy brought here one day. You wound that 
thing up with a key, and it squealed disgust- 
ingly and pointed at some figures with its nose. 
I should not like — I certainly should not like, 
Mrs. Dolliver — to have any of my children 
taught to squeal and point at things with their 
79 


THE DOINGS OF THE DOLLIVERS 


noses. If that is education,” said Mr. Dolliver, 
“I hope that my children may never be edu- 
cated.” 

“Dear me, how foolish men are!” Mrs. Dol- 
liver replied. “Of course there is all the dif- 
ference in the world between an educated pig 
and an educated child.” And she sent for the 
paper doll. 

The paper doll, being made of paper entirely, 
would seem to have some connection with edu- 
cation — at least that is the way Mrs. Dolliver 
felt about it. 

When the paper doll was seated in the 
parlour, with Mr. and Mrs. Dolliver (both very 
solemn) seated before her, they both began talk- 
ing to her about being ambitious for their chil- 
dren, and thinking that an education was the 
best thing to give them. 

“I don't know,” said the paper doll; “it seems 
to me that you might give Dolly an education 
and give Tommy a bicycle, and give Which and 
T'other a spanking. I think if I were giving 
8o 


DOLLY’S EDUCATION 


things to your children, that is about the way I 
should arrange it.” 

Mr. Dolliver nodded his head very solemnly. 

“I think you are exactly right,” he said. 
‘‘We will give Dolly an education.” 

“She is the only one of your children that 
would be able to take it, Lm sure,” was the paper 
doll’s opinion. 

“Is it bad to take? Will we give it to her 
with a spoon? Must we hold her nose?” Mrs. 
Dolliver asked anxiously. You see she had 
mixed education with cough syrup or something 
of that sort. 

The paper doll rustled and laughed. 

“An education,” she said, “is teaching a per- 
son to do things.” 

“Out of books,” put in Mr. Dolliver very 
seriously. “An education, as I understand it, is 
learning things out of books.” 

“Books!” echoed the paper doll with a shud- 
der. “Oh, pray don’t mention books to me! 
I’ve met a great many people who came out of 
8i 


THE DOINGS OF THE DOLLIVERS 


the magazines, and they tell me a magazine is 
quite a lively place; but a book is a jail — just 
something to be shut up in. Ethel puts me in 
one every now and then to — er — to straighten 
me out — and then forgets me. Dull! I don’t 
wonder people say books are dull. For my part, 
I think they are frightful.” 

“They always struck me as rather flat,” agreed 
Mr. Dolliver, politely. 

“Oh, if they struck you,” the paper doll said, 
“Fm sure you couldn’t like them. It’s bad 
enough to be shut up in them to press — I don’t 
know what I’d do if one struck me.” 

While all this talk was going on, Dolly Dol- 
liver herself came in. 

“What is it. Mamma?” she asked. “May I 
stay and hear what you say?” 

“It is about your education,” Mrs. Dolliver 
explained, solemnly. “Your dear father and I 
are very ambitious for our children. It is true 
that your father is a lame man, and that I have 
82 


DOLLY’S EDUCATION 


the baby sewed into my arm; but we want our 
children to have advantages.” 

‘‘Oh, to go to school — do you mean to go to 
school?” Dolly asked, dancing about over the 
room. “Ethel goes to school, and I think it 
must be just lovely. She says that Nurse says 
that all a child has to do to get an education is 
to mind her book.” 

“Mind her book!” shivered the paper doll. 
^'Mind it! Oh, that would be awful! Books 
are such silly things, and you never know what 
they’re going to say next. For my part, I think 
it would be injurious to any child to be made 
to mind her book. I believe that the book 
should be made to mind her'' 

Now Mrs. Dolliver had hoped that the paper 
lady would be willing to teach her children ; but 
she saw from this that if books had anything 
to do with school, the paper doll would not suit 
for a teacher. 

“We will get books, then,” she said, “some 

83 


THE DOINGS OF THE DOLLIVERS 


small ones to begin on, and Dolly shall teach 
them to mind her. Will that be getting an 
education^” 

The paper doll thought it would be, so Dolly 
was furnished with a half dozen tiny books 
which Ethel had placed on the Dollivers’ centre 
table. She made them mind by building play- 
houses for Which and T’other out of them. 
She enjoyed this very much, and so did the 
twins ; so all the Dollivers decided that an edu- 
cation was a fine thing. 


84 


IX 


THE CHINA PIGS 

After the Dollivers made a garden — and 
more especially, after the family bought the 
crumply-horned cow — they became very much 
interested in all matters of farm life. Mr. 
Dolliver said that he was extremely anxious to 
keep some pigs. He thought that pork would 
be an excellent thing for the family table, and 
he thought the pigs would eat up the scraps. 

Mrs. Dolliver called his attention to the fact 
that all of their food was china, and fast to the 
china plates, so that (as she had said before, to 
the china dog, when he asked for leavings) there 
never were, and never would be, and never could 
be any scraps. Still Mr. Dolliver insisted upon 
the pig idea; and he was more than delighted 
when Ethel brought home three little pigs from 

85 


THE DOINGS OF THE DOLLIVERS 


the store, and put them in the Dollivers’ par- 
lour. 

Mrs. Dolliver protested that the parlour was 
not the proper place for pigs; but Mr. Dolliver 
answered her that these were extremely refined 
pigs, and he thought they looked quite as well 
in the parlour as most of the visitors who came 
to see the Dolliver family. 

It was not so annoying during the daytime, 
when the pigs could not move about; but so 
soon as it was dark, and Ethel had gone up- 
stairs to bed, and the Dollivers’ day-time began, 
the pigs rambled, grunting, all about the Dol- 
liver house. They had the most ridiculous, self- 
satisfied expression anyone ever saw on the face 
of even a toy pig. 

One — and it was the biggest and the fattest 
one — finally climbed up on Mrs. Dolliver’s bed, 
and refused to get down! All the family 
brought all the things which they thought might 
interest a pig and displayed them before this in- 
different porker; but it refused to budge. It sat 
86 



One finally cliinlied np on Mrs. Dolliver’s bed 










THE CHINA PIGS 

and grinned at them in the most idiotic, mad- 
dening way. 

Mrs. Dolliver said that if she were not a loyal 
subject of Queen Ethel’s, she would refuse to 
have those pigs in the house. Which and 
T’other, even, were not as great a nuisance. 
Finally, Dolly Dolliver came home from dust- 
ing the mantel, one day, and said that she had 
learned how to deal with a pig. A pig, it 
seemed, was a perverse animal; if you wanted 
it to go in a certain direction, you must drive it 
in exactly the opposite. 

“But,” said Mrs. Dolliver, plaintively, “I 
don’t know what is the opposite thing to those 
pigs sitting on my bed.” 

“Why, getting up is the opposite thing to 
going to bed,” Dolly said. “You want those 
pigs to get up, so the best thing for you to do 
is to make nightgowns and nightcaps for all of 
them, and pretend as hard as you can that you 
want them to go to bed.” 

This excellent plan worked exactly as Dolly 

87 


THE DOINGS OF THE DOLLIVERS 


had said. Mrs. Dolliver made the nightcaps 
and nightgowns, “With frills and a little bit of 
lace; because, you know, they’re really very 
nice pigs, though one doesn’t want them on 
one’s bed.” 

These, the whole Dolliver family proceeded 
to put upon the pigs; and for the first time in 
their history the pigs ran. Which and T’other 
howled with delight over the appearance of the 
two little pigs in their nightcaps. Mr. Dol- 
liver bravely struggled to get the large, fat 
pig into a mother hubbard gown with bishop 
sleeves. 

“They’re so irresponsive,” complained Mrs. 
Dolliver. “I’m sure if I had exerted myself so 
much for any other of my friends, it would have 
been better appreciated.” 

“You couldn’t exactly call the pigs your 
friends,” remonstrated Tommy Dolliver, who 
had come to his father’s assistance, and was try- 
ing to add a night-cap to the large pig’s cos- 
tume. 


88 


THE CHINA PIGS 


“I shouldn’t want to call them enemies,” ob- 
jected his mother. 

And just then the large fat pig set the 
example and fled squealing, gown, night-cap 
and all, with the others following her. 

‘'Dear me,” said Mrs. Dolliver, “I think 
raising pigs is very wearing. It takes so much 
sewing. I’m very glad the paper doll was not 
here to see it. I’m afraid we all looked rather 
ridiculous — but at least we have found out how 
to get rid of the pigs on the bed.” 

‘I know an Indian that just loves pigs,” said 
Tommy. 

“Perhaps he would come here and attend to 
these,” suggested Mr. Dolliver. 


89 


X 


THE INDIANS 

The Dollivers had a strange adventure with 
Indians soon after they got the crumply-horned 
cow and the pigs. The knitted Indian of whom 
Tommy had spoken came and desired to work 
for them. He was a short, squat little creature, 
with the most terrible eyes, and an expression of 
great misery on his face; yet he proved to be a 
good-natured soul, and, as he and the crumply- 
horned cow struck up a great friendship, he was 
extremely useful to the Dollivers. 

He told the Dolliver family that his name 
was Captain Jack, and he made matters ex- 
tremely pleasant for them all by taking entire 
charge of the three china pigs, who slept in his 
bed and followed him about all the time. 

It was about three weeks after Captain Jack 
90 


THE INDIANS 


came to be a member of the Dolliver household, 
that they were awakened, just after Queen Ethel 
had gone up to bed, by a violent shrieking. 

“It is a war cry,” Mrs. Dolliver moaned; and 
for once she was exactly right. 

The whole family ran and found Captain Jack 
huddled up in his bed with the three pigs about 
him, his teeth chattering. 

“It is my ancient enemy Highup,” Captain 
Jack said. “He has dug up the hatchet again. 
He’ll never rest till he’s killed me.” 

Dolly Dolliver peeped out of the window and 
saw standing before the house a most appalling 
figure. It was a jointed Indian doll — two 
joints to each limb, which made him very 
active and fierce. He had tattooing upon his 
arms, and several red feathers from the duster 
gave him a war bonnet. There were moccasins 
on his little feet, which accounted for his hav- 
ing slipped up so silently that he was obliged 
to give a war whoop to let the Dolliver family 
know he was there. 


91 


THE DOINGS OF THE DOLLIVERS 


“Dear me!” said Dolly Dolliver, “he looks 
like the Indians in Queen Ethel’s book. I think 
it would be very interesting to talk to him!” 

And what did this absurd girl do, but open 
the door and trip out to the Indian, while Mrs. 
Dolliver wrung her hands, and Mr. Dolliver 
fainted, as he always did when anything exciting 
happened. For a long time Dolly Dolliver stood 
facing the strange doll, with her hands behind 
her. Finally she said: 

“Do you want to see any of our family?” 

“Whoop! Me big Injun!” cried the jointed 
doll. 

“Oh, not so very,” said Dolly calmly. 
“You’re just the twenty-five cent size, aren’t 
you?” 

“Twenty-five,” muttered the jointed doll 
sulkily. “Me twenty-five, hey? Well, you 
twenty- three when me come after you.” 

“Don’t be slangy,” said Dolly severely. 

He was silent a moment, and then he began 
again : 


92 


THE INDIANS 

“Whoop! Me big Injun! Me want Captain 
Jack/’ 

“What do you want of Captain Jack*?” asked 
Dolly. 

“Me eat Captain Jack up. Me heap brave — 
me big Injun!” the Indian doll shouted. 

“Dear me!” said Dolly Dolliver. “How 
very silly that would be. Why, Captain Jack 
is awfully tough.” 

(“Yes, yes, I am!” howled poor Captain Jack, 
from inside the house.) 

“He’s awfully tough,” Dolly went on, laugh- 
ing. “Besides, he’s knitted on the outside, and 
he’s stuffed with cotton inside, and he’d get all 
into your teeth. What do you want to eat him 
for, anyway*? Haven’t you anything better to 
eat*?” 

“Me big Injun,” repeated the Indian doll, 
stubbornly. 

“You said that before, you know,” objected 
Dolly. 

The Indian doll looked really angry. 

93 


THE DOINGS OF THE DOLLIVERS 


“I have to say it all the time/’ he hissed. 
“That’s what Indians always say — especially 
when they have feathers in their hair and mocca- 
sins on. And Indians have to chase somebody. 
Captain Jack was the only person I could find 
who would run, so I have been chasing him, ever 
since I can remember.” 

Now Captain Jack (who was something of an 
Indian himself) had stolen up behind Dolly 
and the big brave Indian as they stood whis- 
pering. Captain Jack didn’t wear moccasins, 
but his poor old feet were just made of felt, so 
he could steal about as softly as any jointed 
doll with moccasins on. He listened to the 
words of the jointed brave, and then he lowered 
his head and butted the brave in the small of 
the back, so that he fell flat on the floor, rolled 
over, and lay there astonished and kicking. 

“Whoop!” yelled Captain Jack, jumping up 
and down on his enemy’s stomach. “Me big 
Injun, too. Me never run any more!” 

And he never did. The jointed doll stayed 

94 


THE INDIANS 


about for quite a while, till Ethel’s young uncle 
carried it away to put on the mantel beside his 
pipes in his smoking room; but neither Captain 
Jack nor any of the Dollivers was ever the least 
bit afraid of the jointed doll again. 

“That is the way with almost everything,” 
said Dolly Dolliver. “If you run from it, it is 
perfectly certain to run after you — unless it is the 
china pigs, and they won’t run at all.” 

“But if you jump up and down on its 
stomach,” cried Captain Jack, “you are a big 
Injun — whoop!” 

And I am inclined to think Captain Jack was 
right. 


95 


XI 


THE JAPANESE PRINCE 

The Dollivers were all very tired; they had 
been making garden. Mr. Dolliver picked out 
a figure on the carpet where he thought the soil 
was rich and a good garden could be made. 
Then the spotted horse was used to plough the 
garden. The difference between ploughing and 
driving a horse is, that when you plough you say, 
“Gee!” and “Haw!” Mr. Dolliver drove the 
spotted horse all over every bit of that dark 
brown figure on the carpet, and as he kept on 
saying “Gee!” and “Haw!” the land must have 
been thoroughly ploughed. 

Then came the question of what to plant. 
The white kitten, of course, wished to have cat- 
nip. Dolly Dolliver wanted all sorts of beau- 
tiful flowers. Tommy Dolliver asked for pop- 
96 


THE JAPANESE PRINCE 


corn; and Which and T’other simply jumped up 
and down and screamed, “Peanuts! peanuts! 
peanuts !” 

Mrs. Dolliver desired vegetables for the 
family to eat. She said she was very tired of 
living on china dishes, and she was sure that all 
the rest of them were. Dinah, the cook, said 
she thought they ought to plant sunflowers be- 
cause it would make her think of home. No- 
body knew where Dinah’s home had been, nor 
why sunflowers should make her think of it. 
But Mr. Dolliver was very much worried be- 
cause everybody wanted a different thing. 

You know he was a lame man, and very easily 
troubled, anyhow; so finally he got some of all 
the different seeds of all the different things 
that all the different people wanted, and stirred 
them up together; then he planted that garden, 
and said he guessed that everybody would be 
suited. 

They had a great time getting tools to work 
in the ground. The nicest thing they had was 

97 


THE DOINGS OF THE DOLLIVERS 


a rake, which Tommy made by tying a side-comb 
to a lead-pencil. He raked the seeds all 
smoothly in with this, and if the weather had 
been good I’m sure the Dollivers’ garden would 
have proved a success. 

Well, as I told you, the Dolliver family had 
been making a garden, and the Dolliver family 
was tired. The last thing in the world they 
expected was that they would be called upon to 
entertain a prince — and a prince from a very, 
very far-off land, at that. 

But it seems that Queen Ethel had been to a 
party. The souvenirs at this party were little 
Japanese dolls. Ethel came running in to tell 
Nurse all about it, and just before she went down 
to dinner she opened the front door of the Dol- 
liver house and threw the Japanese prince right 
in on the floor. 

My — my — my! How embarrassed the Dol- 
liver family was! The paper doll was there 
visiting them, and she shook and fluttered till 
you might have thought she was going to fly 
98 


THE JAPANESE PRINCE 


away. Finally, when everybody was gone from 
the nursery, and the Dollivers could come to 
life, Mrs. Dolliver whispered to the paper doll: 

“I really don’t know what to do. He is a 
foreign gentleman — probably he is a Japanese 
prince — and truly I never had a prince thrown 
head foremost into the kitchen before. I just 
don’t know what I ought to do.” 

The paper doll shook her head. 

“I couldn’t advise you, Mrs. Dolliver,” she 
said. 'Tor my part, I have often entertained 
princes at my summer home in the table drawer. 
Queen Ethel gets all sorts of people out of the 
magazines and brings them there; so of course 
I am used to high life. But of course I don’t 
speak Japanese.” 

The paper doll seemed to imply that she spoke 
almost any other language known to the human 
tongue. As for Mrs. Dolliver, she thought when 
the paper doll mentioned high life, that she 
meant living up in a table drawer. It offended 
her a little. 


99 


THE DOINGS OF THE DOLLIVERS 


“People have to be very flat before they can 
live in a table drawer,” she said to herself. 
Then she tossed her head and remarked to the 
paper doll : 

“Well, it is true that I have to go about every- 
where with the baby sewed into my arm, and that 
hampers me more than a little — but I can speak 
Japanese” 

And, to prove that this was so, she tripped 
forward to the newcomer (who was now sitting 
upon the floor) , and, bowing very low, remarked 
in a graceful, friendly way: 

“Easy, sneezy, Japanesy^” 

The Japanese Prince looked bewildered. He 
put his hand to his head. Then he arose and 
also bowed very low. 

“I understand,” he said, “that it is easy to 
sneeze — perhaps you allude to me as Japa- 
nesyT’ 

Oh, the paper doll cracked with envy when 
she saw Mrs. Dolliver conversing in Japanese 
with a real Japanese Prince. “And I believe she 
100 


THE JAPANESE PRINCE 


just made it up as she went along — it sounded 
like it,” the paper doll said to herself. “Any- 
how, if she can do it, I can.” So she rustled for- 
ward, bowed, and remarked in a queer little 
papery voice : 

“Hutter, flutter, lump of butter.” 

The prince began to look really distressed. 

“It is all very well for the hutter and the 
flutter: I observe madam, that you both hutter 
and flutter. But truly,” he remarked wistfully, 
“I see no lump of butter, whatever.” 

“‘No lump of butter!’ The dear prince is 
hungry!” cried Mrs. Dolliver. “Why did we 
not think of that at first? Of course he is hun- 
gry,” and she bustled off to set the table. 

“Huh!” grunted Tommy Dolliver. “W’y, 
talkin’ Japanese is easier’n bein’ still. Just 
hear me now.” Then he jumped on his wheel, 
and remarking, “Hikey, tikey, on my bikey,” 
sped away to find Dolly Dolliver. 

The prince looked after him longingly. 

“That is the most sensible person I have seen 
101 


THE DOINGS OF THE DOLLIVERS 

yet,” he declared seriously. “He says, ‘Hikey, 
tikey on his bikey,' and then the little tike does 
hike away on a bike.” 

By the time dinner was ready, Dolly Dolliver 
had come. She did not attempt to talk Japa- 
nese to the prince, but introduced him to every- 
body, and asked him how long he had been in 
this country, and how he liked it. 

The prince said he was born in Hoboken, N. 
J., although he was made of Japanese material 
— came of Japanese parents, was perhaps 
exactly the way he put it. At first, he per- 
sisted in calling the Dolliver house an asylum, 
and supposing all the dolls in it were insane; 
but Dolly Dolliver finally explained to him that 
her mother and the paper doll had been trying 
to talk Japanese; and when they finally realized 
that he understood English perfectly, and had 
never heard a word of Japanese, they all passed a 
very pleasant evening together. 


102 


XII 

THE ESKIMO 

After the visit of the Japanese Prince turned 
out so well, Mrs. Dolliver got quite a notion 
of entertaining distinguished foreigners. She 
said that she believed she had a talent for it, 
and it was with delight that she welcomed an- 
other opportunity of this sort when Ethel 
brought home the Eskimo doll. She soon had 
him seated in the parlour and had sent to the 
paper doll in great haste. 

‘‘Doesn’t he look too cunning and North 
Poley for anything she inquired of the paper 
lady, holding the parlour door ajar a crack and 
letting her look in to where the little white 
furry fellow sat. Which and T’other flat on the 
hearth-rug before him. 

103 


THE DOINGS OF THE DOLLIVERS 


‘'What makes him sit in that peculiar wayT’ 
inquired the paper doll. 

“Oh, he has rheumatism in his knees from 
the cold climate,’’ Mrs. Dolliver explained 
promptly though, between you and me, I 
haven’t the least belief in the world that she had 
ever thought of it till that moment. “Besides,” 
she added, “that’s the way they all sit in his 
country; it’s more convenient, in his — well, 
whatever they call the snow huts they live in.” 

“And what did you intend to do about him?” 
the paper doll asked. 

Mrs. Dolliver’s brow puckered with anxiety, 
and she sighed. 

“I did want to give him some sort of a func- 
tion — a function is a party, you know; Queen 
Ethel said so. It’s things to eat, on a table, and 
all that.” 

“Well, I should think I did know!” the paper 
doll retorted in an injured tone. “Associating 
with ladies who come out of the Sunday supple- 
ments, I am sure that I know rather more about 
104 


THE ESKLMO 

functions than you do. Did you intend to have 
a reception?” 

“Well, it would have to be a cold reception,” 
Mrs. Dolliver debated. “Because, you see, 
Queen Ethel has lent Dinah to her little cousin 
Sallie, and nobody but Dinah can make the 
range burn — is that right? Somehow, it doesn’t 
sound as it ought to. Well, it takes Dinah to 
make things hot here; and I don’t know how 
he’ll like a cold reception.” 

“I should think it was the very thing,” the 
paper doll said. “You know, these Eskimos 
can’t endure anything hot. In warm weather 
you have to crack up ice and drip it down their 
throats to keep them alive. Or maybe, that is 
mush dogs I’m thinking about. Mush dogs, you 
know, the kind that draw the sledges up in those 
arctic places, and that go faster when you cry 
‘Mush on — mush on!’ Anyhow, it’s some crea- 
ture around the North Pole somewhere. Give 
him a cold reception, by all means. I shall put 
on my furs that Queen Ethel made out of writ- 

105 


THE DOINGS OF THE DOLLIVERS 


ing paper with such beautiful little black ermine 
tips of ink.” And she hurried home to prepare 
for the occasion. 

After all, when it came to a reception, there 
was nobody to invite but the paper doll and the 
Japanese Prince. These both came, and the 
Eskimo greeted them very effusively. He was 
a pink-faced little doll with blue eyes, and bare 
hands and feet sticking out of his white fur. 
When Dolly Dolliver saw him, she asked at 
once about whether his hands and feet didn’t 
get frost-bitten; but her mother said that it was 
extremely impolite to question people who had 
come a long way and had such wonderful things 
to relate. 

“I shall be delighted to tell you the story of 
my home in the long, cold shadow of the North 
Pole,” the Eskimo said, when they were all 
settled in a circle about him ready to listen. 

‘‘Oh, — is it a story?” asked Dolly rather 
huffily. “But I needn’t ask — travellers never 
tell anything but stories when they get back.” 
106 


THE ESKIMO 


Mrs. Dolliver silenced her with a look. The 
Eskimo seemed a bit taken aback. But presently 
he started off in great shape. 

“Once upon a time, there was a little polar 
bear, and he lived in the shadow of the North 
Pole. He never saw anybody but himself 
and his Mammy, and so he got dreffle lone- 
some.” 

“How could he see himself asked Which 
suddenly. 

“What makes you say dreffle?” put in T’other 
promptly. 

“Saw himself in an ice looking-glass — a nice 
looking-glass — an ice looking-glass,” gabbled 
the Eskimo so fast that it made everybody’s head 
swim. “I say dreffle because it was dreffle,” he 
added sulkily. “Who’s telling this story, any- 
how?” 

Nobody said a word, and after a minute or 
two he went on, 

“The little polar bear was dreffle lonesome, 
and he used to say to his mammy, ‘Oh, Mammy 
107 


THE DOINGS OF THE DOLLIVERS 


bear, Fm so lonesome — lonesome — lonesome ! I 
most think Fll die of lonesomeness/ ” 

Mrs. Dolliver would have spanked Which 
and T’other for interrupting had not the Es- 
kimo got the tale under way again. As it was 
they all listened with great interest while he 
proceeded : 

‘‘So Mammy Bear, one day when she was out 
a-hunting, she picked up a little Eskimo, and 
she carried him home to the little polar bear, 
and she set him down in front of the little polar 
bear, and said to him (to the little polar bear, 
not to the little Eskimo), ‘There now! There’s 
a playmate for you. Play with him, and don’t 
tell me any more about being so lonesome ! I’m 
dreffle tired of hearing about it.’ 

“So the little polar bear and the little Eskimo 
they stood and dest looked at each other and 
looked at each other. Then the little polar bear 
he went up to the little Eskimo and gave him a 
tap on his little chest, and the little Eskimo fell 
over and hollered most dreffle. By and by, 
108 


THE ESKIMO 


when he found out he wasn’t dead, he got up 
again, and he went and gave the little polar bear 
a tap, and the little polar bear he rolled over 
and over and hollered too. Then they was 
friends forever and ever, and the little polar 
bear said : 

“ ‘Come on, Eskimo; let’s play ice tag.’ ” 

“What’s ice tag^?” asked Which. 

“How do you play it*?” put in T’other. 

The Eskimo didn’t mind this at all, but he 
smiled very wisely as he said : 

“Ice tag is most the same as wood tag; only if 
you get off of ice they can catch you and tag you, 
and you’re it — that’s how you play it. So the 
little polar bear and the little Eskimo, they set 
in to play ice tag; but the house was all ice, and 
the yard was all ice, and the back fence and the 
wash-tubs were all ice, and the trees and bushes 
were all ice, and the country where this was was 
all ice — so they couldn’t never get off of ice! 
Well they ran ’round an’ ’round — ’round an’ 
’round — and ’round an’ ’round. 

109 


THE DOINGS OF THE DOLLIVERS 


He paused and looked about him. 

Nobody said a word. All listened, to hear 
what really happened. 

“Well,” said the Eskimo, slowly, “well, I 
s’pect they’re running yet, ’cause, you see, they 
can’t never get off of ice — and that’s all.” 

He had been standing, looking very proud 
and wise. Now he sat down suddenly, and 
seemed entirely to forget about his story. 

“How did you know all that?’ asked Dolly 
Dolliver suspiciously. 

This brought the Eskimo to his feet with a 
bounce. He made them all a low bow, then 
thumped his fuzzy little fur chest and shouted : 

“I was that Eskimo !” 

“You were?’ giggled Dolly. “Well, accord- 
ing to that, you’re up at the North Pole this min- 
ute, running ’round an’ ’round on a cake of ice, 
after the polar bear, or with the polar bear after 
you. You couldn’t really expect us to believe 
that, could you? I think — I really think — that 
you’ll have to get up another story.” 

no 


THE ESKIMO 


“Won’t!” said the Eskimo, grumpily. ‘Tm 
not a two-story person.” 

“Oh,” snickered Dolly, hurrying out to help 
her mother bring in the cold reception, as Mrs. 
Dolliver persisted in calling the china lunch on 
the china plates, which was all she had to serve. 
“Oh, he must be a sort of cottage !” 

“I think we might call him a story-and-a-half 
affair,” chuckled Tommy Dolliver, who was 
helping with the waiting. “That tale of his 
might really be mentioned as a story and a half.” 

But Queen Ethel gave the Eskimo doll away 
next day. And so the Dollivers never saw him 
again nor heard any more of his charming 
adventures. 


Ill 


XIII 


THE DOLLIVERS ATTEND THE CIRCUS 

It was a wonderful, wonderful time for the 
Dollivers when the Noah’s ark came to anchor 
right at the corner of their house. Such delight- 
ful people, the Noah family, and such a variety 
of animals in the ark! 

Dolly Dolliver went down to them the very 
first day, and she was soon nursing the tiger 
in her lap — she mistook it for the cat — and chat- 
ting away to Mrs. Noah as though they had all 
been friends for years. 

The only thing which interfered with the 
pleasant intercourse between the Dollivers and 
the Noah family was, that the Noahs were rather 
small — and their animals also. 

Tommy Dolliver was the one that proposed 
the circus. He said that while they had the ark 
112 


DOLLIVERS ATTEND THE CIRCUS 


there, and so many animals, there was no reason 
in the world why they shouldn’t have a circus. 
Dolly Dolliver pointed out the difficulty about 
the small size of the Noahs and the animals, 
and Tommy offered to go and visit the fairy 
who lived on top of the clock, and get her to 
change the Noah people and their animals to a 
larger size — “For one night only.” 

So the thing was done; a circus tent was con- 
trived from the centre-table and its cover, and 
a ring was laid out on a round braided rug. 
Everybody brought his own chair, or box, or 
bench; and as there was no admission charged, 
nobody complained. 

Mr. Noah was ring-master. Shem and Ham 
and Japheth were clowns, and assisted the real 
toy clown from the toy closet, while their wives 
were the riders and trapeze performers. 

Mr. Noah stood in the middle of the ring and 
cracked his whip. Then the whole procession 
came in — such a procession as no circus in the 
world ever had before ! For the dog walked be- 

113 


THE DOINGS OF THE DOLLIVERS 

side the cow, and was just the same size. The 
elephant was paired off with an animal-cracker- 
elephant, which Mr. Noah announced through 
his spieler’s horn, as “The sacred white elephant 
of Siam!” 

The camel had lost a leg, but he ambled along 
on three legs just as comfortably as he would on 
four. The sheep and the wolf walked side by 
side. The leopard and the rabbit (also just of 
a size) followed; and after them came the 
hyena and the gazelle (on the best of terms), 
and the tiger with the mouse (the mouse being 
somewhat bigger and rather fiercer looking than 
his partner, the tiger) . The birds — not any par- 
ticular kind of bird you know — just plain 
birds — flew along almost anywhere. They 
were half as large as the elephant, and, being 
made of wood, people were rather afraid to have 
them flying through the air, lest someone get a 
thump on the head; so that they were finally 
asked to walk in the procession, which they very 
considerately did. 


114 


DOLLIVERS ATTEND THE CIRCUS 


The performance was well under way when 
Which and T’other appeared with all their 
mother’s cups full of pink lemonade. The Dol- 
liver family and the Noah family had never seen 
pink lemonade, but the paper doll professed an 
old acquaintance with that pleasing drink. 

“Oh, yes,” she said, “it is the same as the red 
ink that Queen Ethel uses to colour some of the 
people whom she cuts out of the magazines, 
who have been born black-and-white, instead of 
coloured like me.” 

She rustled very elegantly as she said it, and 
took a cup of the lemonade and drank it with a 
very aristocratic air. The Dollivers and the 
Noah family felt obliged to do the same, though 
in fact they thought it tasted particularly nasty, 
which probably it did, for it was indeed, as the 
paper doll had said, a drop of red ink in water. 

Mr. Noah hit upon a very fine idea for getting 
rid of his cup of red ink and water. He declared 
himself so devoted to the elephant that he felt 
obliged to share anything good which he had 

115 


THE DOINGS OF THE DOLLIVERS 


with that intelligent beast. The convenient and 
obliging elephant drank the pink lemonade as 
though he had been brought up on it, and it was 
as good as any part of the performance to see 
him do so. 

The Japanese Prince had come in, and was 
doing some juggler’s tricks, walking across a 
slack-rope, balancing himself as he went with a 
tiny umbrella, and all the while throwing some 
little balls into the air. You never would have 
thought, to look at him now, that he was fabri- 
cated in Hoboken, N. J. You never would have 
known to look at those balls that they were 
simply green peas! 

All the company was deeply interested in these 
things, when there came a scream of pain 
from the elephant. He had been attempting to 
steal some more pink lemonade, and Which and 
T’other had run a small pin in his trunk as he 
poked it over among their cups. 

Mr. Noah said he thought this was a very un- 
kind way to treat his elephant. It was plain 
116 


DOLLIVERS ATTEND THE CIRCUS 


that he would have been glad to have Which 
and T’other spanked — as part of the perform- 
ance. But since Mr. Dolliver was a lame man, 
and Mrs. Dolliver had the baby sewed into her 
arm, it always took them quite a time to get 
around to anything; and by the time they had 
made up their minds that Which and T’other 
should be punished, the twins had run away. 

Nobody noticed that in going. Which and 
T’other had left the whole bucket of pink 
lemonade. Nobody noticed when the twins 
came stealing back to watch the antics of the Jap- 
anese prince on his slack rope. But suddenly the 
elephant, who had filled his trunk full — oh, very 
full — of that pink lemonade, charged upon 
those unfortunate twins and blew it all over 
them in a great stream like a garden hose, or at 
least it was like a garden hose to people the size 
of Which and T’other. They squeaked, as they 
always did. T’other whimpered : 

“Oh, Whichy, are you killed?’ 

And Which answered : 

117 


THE DOINGS OF THE DOLLIVERS 


“Yes, T’other, I believe I is. The pink lemon- 
ade’s all in my eyes. I wouldn’t mind it if 
’twasn’t for my eyes. Oh, yow — yow — yow! 
Eee — ow! Ah — ooh!’' 

“That’s always the way,” sighed Mrs. Dol- 
liver. “If we have any opportunity for elegant 
diversion (Dolly, this is elegant diversion, isn’t 
it?) Which and T’other are sure to be partially 
destroyed in the course of it.” 

And she rose up to go and get her offspring and 
take them home. 

“Pray don’t disturb yourself, madam,” said 
Mr. Noah very pleasantly. “I think we are all 
enjoying the spectacle of those two young per- 
sons in their present condition. I know the 
elephant is; why, just look at the dear creature 
— he is positively laughing!” 

And this was true. The elephant was so de- 
lighted that he not only laughed, but brought 
out a forgotten accomplishment of his to please 
the people, and danced a hornpipe for them. 
He had once belonged to a sailor, and no doubt 
118 


DOLLIVERS ATTEND THE CIRCUS 


the sailor taught him to dance the hornpipe. 
If you have never seen an elephant dance a horn- 
pipe, you don’t know how amusing it is. 

Considering the fun they got out of seeing the 
twins drenched with pink lemonade, and the 
elephant’s dance, the persons who attended this 
circus agreed that it was the best they ever saw. 

Which was undoubtedly true, as it was cer- 
tainly the only one they ever saw. 


119 


XIV 

THE JOY RIDE 

It was dark in the nursery — and quite still. 
All at once the little china rooster kicked his 
feet free from the tangle of green-and-brown 
which you will always see painted about the feet 
of china roosters, and hopped up on the fence, 
ready to crow in the Dollivers’ day. 

“Silly stuff,” he said, as he clutched the top 
of the fence with his claws. “How does any- 
body expect a chicken to get about with a load 
of rocks and vegetation of that sizeT’ 

He crowed in the most approved fashion. 
(Really, you know, he was a whistle, and his 
crow sounded a good deal like the call of a bob- 
white.) Mr. Dolliver rose to the duties of the 
day. 

“I think, my dear,” he said to Mrs. Dolliver, 
120 


THE JOY RIDE 


‘1 think I shall try that new car this morning.” 
A small boy who lives next door had been in 
playing with Queen Ethel the day before, and 
left his tin automobile lying in the middle of 
the nursery floor. “I really feel that I ought to 
make a test of the machine,” Mr. Dolliver said 
largely. “I am quite sure that the owner de- 
sires to sell it to me, and is only waiting until I 
shall approve it.” 

By this time the Dolliver family were all out 
in front of the house; Mr. Dolliver with his 
cane tied fast to his hand; Mrs. Dolliver with 
the baby sewed into her arm; Dolly Dolliver, 
looking quite the prettiest and sweetest of the 
lot, in her frilled pink silk frock and little white 
lace hat; Tommy Dolliver with his sailor suit 
and the rolling sailor-walk that he was at such 
pains to keep up ; Which and T’other, the twins, 
in mischief as usual; and even Aunt Dinah from 
the kitchen with her turban twitched over one 
eye. They all stood and stared — for the auto- 
mobile was gone ! 


121 


THE DOINGS OF THE DOLLIVERS 


Surely the night before it had been left lying 
almost in the middle of the room. 

“It was exactly here/’ Mr. Dolliver pro- 
nounced dramatically, pointing with his lead- 
pencil cane. “This machine is metal, so no wild 
beast can have devoured it. I fancy the knitted 
man would fear to steal it. Besides, we should 
have heard the noise, had he made the attempt. 
Where can it be^” 

At that moment there was a creaking, whir- 
ring sound above them. They all looked up to 
the bracket where the Japanese Prince lived, 
close by the clock. There stood the automobile. 
In it sat a figure, in cap and goggles made of 
brown tissue paper, and this individual was ap- 
parently winding up the machine — cranking it, 
Mr. Dolliver hastened to explain. 

Yes indeed, after Queen Ethel dumped the 
Dolliver family head and heels in on the floor 
of their house that evening and shut the doors — 
being done with them for the time — nurse had 
made the paper cap and goggles for the Japanese 
122 


THE JOY RIDE 

Prince, and set the little fellow in place on his 
bracket. 

“Well, I must say!” began Mr. Dolliver in- 
dignantly, and stopped. 

“Must you?” inquired Mrs. Dolliver solicit- 
ously. “Pray don’t — if you’d rather not.” 

Her spouse paid no attention to the interrup- 
tion. “I must say,” he repeated with cutting 
emphasis, “that the impudence of some people 
is extraordinary. I intended to buy that ma- 
chine. I was in negotiations with the parties 
who — the parties — ” 

His voice trailed off doubtfully into silence, 
for the Japanese Prince had got his auto wound 
up, and was now very cleverly descending the 
wall in fly-fashion — they can do such things at 
night in the nursery. Down to the floor he came, 
and then across it, clicking and jerking a bit, 
but going right ahead. Mr. Dolliver was 
never out of temper long. When he saw the 
car approach, he began to beam with satisfac- 
tion. 


123 


THE DOINGS OF THE DOLLIVERS 


‘‘After all, I have been told,” he said grandly, 
“that the Japanese make excellent chuff ers. 
No doubt this good man is anxious to hire to me 
in that capacity, should I decide to purchase the 
car in which he now is speeding toward us.” 

“What’s a chuff er*?” asked Which. 

“It’s the man that makes the machine go chuff- 
chuff!” returned T’other, without stopping to 
think — or to blink either, for that matter. 

“But this machine doesn’t go chuff, chuff!” 
demurred Which. “It just screaks a little. Is 
he the screaker then*?” 

“Hush, my dears,” said Mrs. Dolliver almost 
mechanically. She had to say that so much to 
Which and T’other that she could say it quite 
readily in her sleep. 

Her reason for silencing them now was that 
the automobile with the Japanese Prince in it, 
all becapped and begoggled, was drawing up 
beside their little group. 

“Miss Dolly,” cried the Oriental, leaping from 
his seat and bowing very low, without taking off 
124 



“We shall be pleased to go with you on a trial trip, sir/’ 








Vt 


' K. 


■ . -r 1 

,‘ ',*»•>•, -V T ' > ■■J' 



■ /“ 'Us'H »*''.' ' ’ 

^■v■ ,. -. ; 







>1 


Pf. 
















• 


■pK .iVf^y. ■ V • 

*^-l!f " 4 *« ^ ;f ♦ . " i ■ 


-li 


' ■ % i. -iiat. 

’~ rp — * j ' w 'mm m ' f * • < • * 


=:* ' 


•i^- • 

:.'■ 

t. ■ • 

*. * T < ^ 

’♦* I L‘- 
^ ^ '/ ♦ ' 


• 7 f -• 

if ‘ 


. « 


I- , ‘'JKvv •, 

Mm 




'■ -* ' # « . 





THE JOY RIDE 


his cap — for you know that is Oriental fashion 
’ — “will you join me in a joy ride*?” 

Now the Japanese Prince fondly fancied that 
his kimono looked like the bearskin coat of the 
motorist, but really the combination of the gay 
flowered robe with the cap and goggles was so 
funny that Dolly could not answer for giggling. 
When she failed to speak, Mr. Dolliver made 
the reply on her behalf. 

“We shall be pleased to go with you on a 
trial trip, sir — a trial trip,” he said patronisingly. 
“Then if the machine pleases me, I may say that 
I shall think of purchasing it — I shall certainly 
think very seriously of purchasing it.” 

The Japanese Prince’s little black eyes blinked 
doubtfully through his goggles at this speech, 
but he hardly understood enough of it to know 
whether he ought or ought not to object. He 
imagined that for Mr. Dolliver to purchase the 
machine might mean to clean it, or mend it some- 
how. But what he did comprehend was that 
Dolly, anyhow, was to join him in the joy ride. 
125 


THE DOINGS OF THE DOLLIVERS 


He can not be said to have been positively de- 
lighted with the addition of the entire Dolliver 
family; yet he bore it with his usual patience. 
On one point he was firm — Dolly was to sit in 
the front seat beside him. Mr. and Mrs. Dolli- 
ver placed themselves in the tonneau; Tommy 
Dolliver sat on the floor at their feet; then it be- 
came apparent that there was no way of taking 
the others. 

“We got to go!” Which shrieked. 

“Yes — we got to. We’ll put tacks in the 
road for you, if you don’t take us,” T’other 
added. 

The Japanese Prince looked quite frightened 
at this, and Aunt Dinah, who had plunged into 
the kitchen some little time before, came wad- 
dling out now with a big basket of food. 

“Joy ride ain’t no joy ride widout ye got 
some vittles along,” she declared. “Lemme go 
wid ye, honies — I’se got de coffee-pot to make 
you-all some good coffee.” 

“I think there’s no place on the top of the 
126 


THE JOY RIDE 


automobile for more persons to ride/’ said the 
prince, quite as though he supposed some of 
them might consider riding under the machine. 

“We’ll fix it!” yelled T’other. 

“Yes — you let us fix it!” shouted Which. 
Then they scuttled around the house and 
dragged out an old thread-box which they used 
sometimes to hitch on behind the spotted horse 
for a make-believe waggon. This they tied to 
the back of the automobile. In piled Aunt 
Dinah, and braced herself for the ride. On her 
ample lap sat Which and T’other, and the great 
basket was wedged into a corner. When the 
“trailer” was completed, it made an uncouth 
looking addition to the turnout. 

The Japanese Prince’s spirit was quite broken. 
He had hoped to offer Dolly an elegant atten- 
tion in the American fashion, and he felt that 
his appearance now was ludicrous enough to 
provoke laughter even from the ornamental 
china gentleman on the mantel shelf. Indeed, 
the knitted man and woman came out of the 
127 


THE DOINGS OF THE DOLLIVERS 


work-box to make fun. They roared until they 
almost fell off of Worktable Hill, jeering the 
strange caravan which moved off in the direction 
of the lake. 

I wonder if you remember what that lake was? 
You would just have called it the wash-bowl, 
of course; but dear me! when the faucets were 
turned on and the raging torrents came roar- 
ing down into the white basin, it gave the Dol- 
liver family the same sort of thrill that people 
get at Niagara Falls, and they were never tired 
of picnicking there. Steadily the Japanese 
Prince — sitting in the front seat, and in deep 
dejection of soul — now piloted his auto in the 
direction of this wonderful natural curiosity. 
His attention was continually diverted by 
Which and T’other, who took turns scuffling 
over the rope that attached their spool-box to 
the car. He was partly afraid and partly 
hopeful that their antics would detach them; 
and so absorbed did he become in the matter that 
he paid no attention to the frightful speed he 
128 


THE JOY RIDE 


had on, hurtling forward with the awful swift- 
ness of a kitten after a string, till the machine 
ran rapidly up the washstand leg, poised one 
wild instant on the edge of the basin, with whir- 
ring wheels, and then turned turtle into the 
water ! 

It jerked the spool-box after it. Aunt Dinah 
came with a whoop, flinging out the twins as 
she descended, but holding the precious basket 
of food clasped close until she struck the lake. 
Mrs. Dolliver and the baby were entangled in 
one of the wheels. Mr. Dolliver’s cane pinned 
him down so that he could barely keep his head 
out of water; Tommy, who should have been 
in his element, bawled dismally as he saw his 
sailor suit getting wet, and scrambled wretch- 
edly toward the edge of the basin, while Dolly 
climbed on the top of the machine, and dragged 
the prince after her. 

It was an awful moment. Then, Which and 
T’other (who had sunk immediately to the bot- 
tom by reason of being china-all-over) drown- 
129 


THE DOINGS OF THE DOLLIVERS 


ing and desperate, began to scramble and fight 
under the chain which was attached to the plug 
that closed the vent in the basin’s bottom. 
Their struggles released this. With a mighty 
roar, the swirling waters receded from the 
doomed group (pray do not think all of these 
long words are mine. That’s the way Mr. Dol- 
liver told it afterward) and the strange, drag- 
gled looking company crawling about on the 
bottom of the lake was saved. 

Only Dolly Dolliver looked fairly happy. 
The Japanese Prince knelt at her feet, wringing 
the water out of his kimono skirts. His paper 
cap and goggles were soaked to a pulp. 

‘Td take them off, if I were you,” counselled 
Dolly kindly, as one of them dripped into the 
princely eye and partially blinded it. 

'‘Would you really?’ asked the prince ad- 
miring her courage. 

"Yes,” returned the little lady. "We can 
help each other out of this place and still have 
our picnic.” 


130 


THE JOY RIDE 


“I got de picnic here in my hands — I never 
turned hit loose,” said Aunt Dinah, shaking a 
shower from her petticoats, still clinging faith- 
fully to her basket. '‘Let's go right back to 
you-all's house and eat it. Dey's sangwitches 
an' cake, an' we don't need nuffin mo' to drink.'' 

“We'll go and get the spotted horse and tie 
him to the thread-box,'' Which and T'other 
offered magnanimously. And so, not for the 
first time, that which began as a joy ride in an 
automobile wound up as a serious and prolonged 
labour, with horse assistance. They got the fam- 
ily back to the house; they spread the lunch in 
picnic fashion in the front door-yard; but the 
automobile they could not replace, since it was 
too heavy for them. The next morning when 
Nurse found it lying in the wash basin, she 
said impatiently to Ethel ; 

“I thought I stood this on the bracket. You 
mustn't move things, dearie, after I've tidied 
up the nursery for the night. See here, this toy 
is all rusted — and I can't find the paper cap 

131 


THE DOINGS OF THE DOLLIVERS 


and goggles I made for your little Jap any- 
where/’ 

Oh, it was an innocent face — an innocent 
papier-mache countenance — that the Japanese 
Prince turned to them from his perch on the 
bracket; but deep down in his little Japanese 
heart he knew that he had dragged off that tis- 
sue paper cap and those goggles and let them 
wash away on the receding torrent in the lake, 
careless of choked pipes and the caution of 
plumbers, anxious only to be rid of things which 
got him into such serious trouble. 

“The next time I try a joy ride with Miss 
Dolly,” he declared to himself solemnly, “it 
will be a joy walk, without the rest of her family 
along,” 


132 


XV 


THE DIRIGIBLE BALLOON 

It was not long after the Dollivers had their 
Noah’s Ark performance, that Queen Ethel went 
to a real circus, and brought home a toy balloon, 
which she tied to the corner of the doll-house to 
keep it from flying away to the ceiling. The 
Dollivers were at once greatly excited. And as 
soon as Ethel was gone they wanted Tommy to 
try making an ascension ; but Tommy hung back. 

“There’s nothing in it,” he said sulkily. 

“Oh, yes, there is,” his father insisted, poking 
at the toy balloon which Ethel had tied fast. 
“There’s a quantity of gas in it — that’s what 
makes it float.” 

Mr. Dolliver bobbed about as he spoke, quite 
as though he also had a quantity of gas in him, 
and desired immediately to float away out of 

133 


THE DOINGS OF THE DOLLIVERS 


the second-story window where he and his son 
stood consulting, while the rest of the family 
down in the front yard shaded their eyes and 
looked up. It seems always the proper thing 
to do, if one is staring at a balloon, to shade the 
eyes with the hand, and the Dolliver family did 
it very nicely, although in their world the only 
sun was the small night light that burned always 
during their day in the nursery. The whole fam- 
ily wanted very much to see Tommy make the 
ascension. 

“It is a dirigible balloon, you know,” wheedled 
Mr. Dolliver. 

“What’s dirigible^” demanded Tommy in a 
hostile tone. 

“Dirigible — ah — dirigible is a — a nice long 
word,” returned Mr, Dolliver smoothly. “You 
may find it in any well ordered dictionary — so 
I’m told — so I’m told.” 

“Well, that won’t do me any good when I’ve 
fallen down out of the swing under that balloon 
and broken myself. I’m a sailor, I am. Yo- 

134 


THE DIRIGIBLE BALLOON 


heave-ho!” cried Tommy with a sudden inspira- 
tion. “When a body is born a sailor he has to 
keep it up — unless the folks change his clothes 
and make him something else.” 

Mr. Dolliver waved his hand airily. 

“The sailor of the future, my son — and the 
near future at that — ” he said, “must be able to 
navigate the deeps of air, as freely as the deeps 
of water.” 

“Well,” agreed Tommy, half sullenly, “I’d 
rather fall into the deeps of air than the other, 
because you can breathe air, and water’ll take all 
your paint off and soak your glue loose. But 
unless you’re one of the unbreakable kind, I 
think it’s better to leave flying to the birds.” 

Meantime, down below, a visitor had arrived. 
This was the Japanese Prince, carrying over his 
shoulder, with great elegance, a small paper par- 
asol which Queen Ethel had brought home from 
the circus at the same time she fetched in the 
balloon. 

“Oh, lend me that, your Highness, do 

135 


THE DOINGS OF THE DOLLIVERS 


please !” entreated Dolly. ‘If I had it, I believe 
I should feel perfectly safe to make the balloon 
ascension myself, and let poor Tommy off. See 
how miserable he looks !” 

They glanced up. The wretched Tommy was 
humped on the window sill, his father behind 
him endeavouring, by means of various prods and 
punches, to get him launched. 

“Ow! don’t shove so! I’m a-goin’ in a 
minute !” they heard him exclaim. 

“I shall be delighted to lay my parasol at your 
feet. Miss Dolly,” the Japanese Prince said. I 
think, myself, that he had been reading some 
American story-books. But Dolly only twin- 
kled and laughed. 

“Thank you, I don’t want it at my feet,” she 
told him. “I prefer it over my head.” 

“With a low, Japanese bow, the Prince in- 
stantly transferred his umbrella to her plump 
little hands. She caught the end of the balloon 
string, and just as her unhappy brother was de- 
ciding that there was no help for it, and he must 
136 


THE DIRIGIBLE BALLOON 


become a balloonist whether he would or no, she 
pulled upon the line, and floated away before the 
delighted eyes of her family. 

“Doesn’t she look like an angel?” inquired 
Mrs. Dolliver, with the open fondness mothers 
are apt to show. 

“Oh, no,” Mr. Dolliver bawled down from the 
window. He might be up-stairs, but he was 
near enough to keep Mrs. Dolliver in order. 
“Certainly not in the least like an angel. 
Angels always have bare feet and wear night- 
gowns. I don’t think I ever saw an angel with 
an umbrella, either.” 

“How many angels have you met?” Mrs. Dol- 
liver demanded, with a good deal more sharpness 
than she usually showed toward Mr. Dolliver. 
But the paper doll broke in hastily : 

“At this distance,” said the paper lady, in her 
smoothest society tone, “she resembles my 
family. An aunt of mine, who came out of one 
of our foremost journals, had just Dolly’s 
coquettish way of looking over her shoulder. I 

137 


THE DOINGS OF THE DOLLIVERS 


remember she was a mauve satin with chiffon 
trimmings. Dear me, is that a dirigible bal- 
loon? I’m afraid the child will be carried into 
the gas jet — and then we’ll have an explosion!” 

'‘Oh, yes,” Mr. Dolliver hastened to say. 
“Quite dirigible.” 

He had run down the stairs now, and stood 
leaning on his cane and regarding his daughter’s 
floating figure with the patronising air which 
seemed to say that his cleverness and manage- 
ment alone upheld her in the atmosphere. 

“Well, if it is dirigible, why doesn’t she 
direct it?” inquired the paper doll. “She 
surely can’t wish to be burned up.” 

“You don’t direct balloons,” Mr. Dolliver in- 
formed the visitor, his nose in the air. “It’s let- 
ters you direct — and sometimes servants. Be- 
sides, Dolly had no pen and ink with her — 
she couldn’t direct the balloon, if she wanted 
to.” 

Then the paper doll said a dreadful thing to 
Mr. Dolliver. Mrs. Dolliver dreamed about it 

138 


THE DIRIGIBLE BALLOON 


for ten nights after, and would wake from these 
dreams in a cold perspiration and trembling all 
over — at least that’s what she told Aunt Dinah. 

“1 don’t believe you know what you’re talking 
about,” the paper doll said to Mr. Dolliver. 

The Dolliver family turned pale. Even 
Which and T’other ceased to caper and dance. 
Mr. Dolliver had opened his mouth to utter 
to the paper doll some speech so withering that I 
am glad he never said it. What happened in- 
stead was, that the Japanese Prince grasped his 
arm, pointed upward, and shrieked : 

“Look! Look!” 

They all gazed. Dolly, the Prince’s closed 
umbrella held over her shoulder in the manner 
of a parachute, swinging like a dear little fairy 
beneath the bobbing red toy balloon, was being 
carried swiftly — swiftly — into that burning 
point of light which the Dollivers called the sun, 
and which was in reality the little night light 
left burning by Nurse Anna, turned down till 
one could barely see it. 

139 


THE DOINGS OF THE DOLLIVERS 


“She will be killed!’’ groaned the agonised 
father. “Oh, why do the young people of to- 
day run such risks !” He forgot entirely how he 
had urged ballooning upon his son, and how 
delighted he had been to see Dolly go up. 

“It should have been a dirigible balloon,” 
moaned the paper doll. 

“Yes — yes,” agreed Mrs. Dolliver. “A name 
as long as that would surely hold it down — or 
if it didn’t, at least we could get a good grip on 
one end and pull.” 

Just at that moment, the smooth, shining, red 
cheek of the toy balloon came in contact with the 
flame of the gas jet. There was a mighty ex- 
plosion — almost as loud as one of the fire crack- 
ers which had deafened the Dolliver family 
last Fourth of July, when Nurse Anna had 
let Queen Ethel set off a few in the grate. 
Like a bursting bubble, the round, bobbing red 
ball disappeared. Dolly Dolliver shot down- 
ward for a moment, and a dreadful groan went 
up from the entire Dolliver family. Mr. Dol- 
140 


THE DIRIGIBLE BALLOON 

liver seemed about to faint — his wife hid her 
face. 

“Hi — hi — hi — hi — !” shrieked Which. 

“O wow — wow — wow — goody!” shouted 
T’other. “Pa — say — look — look at ’er now!” 
He twitched Mr. Dolliver’s sleeve. They all 
looked. The Prince’s umbrella had begun 
slowly to unfurl itself; it caught the rush of up- 
ward going air and expanded like a many 
coloured morning-glory. Supported by it, Dolly 
floated gently to the nursery floor, landing on 
the tips of her toes, and executing a little whirl 
before she bowed to them. 

“I think going up in balloons is great fun,” 
she said. 


141 


XVI 

GOING up! 

“There’s a beautiful poem which begins,* 
Tlee as a bird,’ ” Mr. Dolliver remarked pen- 
sively some days after Dolly’s flight in the bal- 
loon. “If you hadn’t destroyed that dirigible 
balloon, daughter, I intended to follow the words 
of the poet, and ‘flee as a bird.’ ” 

“Pop,” said Which, pulling at his father’s 
coat, “did you mean that you was going to flee 
like a flea, or going to fle-fly like a bird?” 

“I’d just as soon go like a flea,” T’other 
chimed in. “The paper doll says if I was a flea, 
and could hop as far as I could, I could go 
higher’n this house.” 

“Well, you hop as high as you can, anyhow, 
don’t you?” Dolly laughed, picking up the 
142 


GOING UP! 


twins, one under each arm, and carrying them 
away from the tormented Mr. Dolliver. 
“Don’t look so discouraged, Pa,” she chirruped 
as she tripped lightly toward a box-kite which 
Ethel’s big cousin Ralph had left in the nursery. 
Which and T’other struggling hard to get away ; 
“Here’s an aeroplane, and it seems to me you are 
just the adventurous scientist to test it.” 

“I — ah — do you really think so?” faltered 
Mr. Dolliver, quite taken aback. “My slight 
lameness has always seemed to me an insuper- 
able objection to aeroplaning. Now, a balloon 
is different.” 

“Yes, indeed,” put in Mrs. Dolliver, wisely, 
“A balloon is round and red, and pops with a 
rather bad smell when it gets into the sun” 
(you remember this is what the Dollivers called 
the gas jet) , “while that aeroplane looks to me 
like quite a comfortable little cottage.” 

“Nothing of the sort, my dear,” Mr. Dolliver 
reproved her, fussily. “An aeroplane is not a 
cottage. I trust you have no intention of hang- 

143 


THE DOINGS OF THE DOLLIVERS 

ing lace curtains at the — ah — windows and 
moving in with your entire family/’ 

“No, just Pa is going to make the ascent,” 
Dolly informed them. “We’ll have a picnic 
over at Couch Ridge and launch the aeroplane 
from there. You have to start it from rising 
ground. The paper doll read in a magazine all 
about how it’s done. I’ll show you.” 

And in no time at all she had the entire Dol- 
liver family so excited that Mr. Dolliver was in 
danger of not being allowed to go up alone. 

“An’ I’ll dest make him some pop-overs for 
his lunch,” Aunt Dinah exclaimed as she 
plunged off in the direction of the kitchen. 
“Pop-overs is mighty light and floatations. 
Looks like dey’d most go up dey own selves.” 

The box-kite was fastened on behind the spot- 
ted horse, and though that excellent animal re- 
garded it with a good deal of suspicion, he 
eventually consented to drag it over to Couch 
Ridge. There the united efforts of the entire 
Dolliver family (the Japanese Prince lending 
144 


GOING UP! 


his assistance) , were required to get it finally on 
the slope, with two lead-pencils under it for 
rollers. 

“Now, if you were me — well, if you were I, 
then — would you just sit in there — in there?'' 
demanded Mr. Dolliver, nervously, pointing to 
the interior of the toy. “Which string shall I 
pull, and how often shall I pull it? I — really, 
it seems to me that one would better take a little 
thought before going up in this thing.” 

He prodded the box-kite with his ready cane, 
and the lead-pencils beneath it began to roll. 
He leaped back with a cry as the aeroplane 
gained speed. But Which and T’other ran 
side by side, like a pair of ponies used to double 
harness, and cast themselves into the rear of 
the machine. As it left the hill, they scrambled 
well to the centre, and stood there grinning at 
their startled family. 

On the crest of the Couch stood the entire 
Dolliver household, excepting the twins. Mr. 
Dolliver regarded the experiment with knitted 

145 


THE DOINGS OF THE DOLLIVERS 


brow (at least that is what he said he did, but 
Mrs. Dolliver objected. She called his atten- 
tion to the fact that his head was china, and 
while the stockinette individuals that lived in 
Nurse Anna’s work-box and served for pin- 
cushions might have knitted brows, he never 
could. Anyhow, he looked serious) . Mrs. Dol- 
liver clasped the baby close, and gazed after 
the twins, half willing that they might come to 
some accident which would curtail their activ- 
ities without hurting them too much. Aunt 
Dinah set her hands on her hips and stared. 

“An’ dem pop-overs never got in,” she 
mourned. “Dey was dat light dey would have 
carried dat whole contraption up in de air.” 

Tommy Dolliver sat down on the side of the 
hill and laughed. 

“If they make a go of it,” he said to nobody 
in particular, “I believe I’ll be an aeroplaner 
instead of a sailor. I guess these clothes’ll do 
just as well for it. My, but that looks easy!” 

Only Dolly Dolliver and the Japanese Prince 
146 


GOING UP! 


saw the danger which was impending. The 
twins were china-all-over — and exactly alike. 
They were quite too heavy to go in for flying. 
The box-kite gained some momentum from its 
rush down the side of the couch; it wavered a 
bit; it would have risen, had it not been for the 
weight of the twins dragging it down. 

Dolly and the prince laid hold of the cable, 
which had not been cut. (It was the kite string, 
but cable is so much nicer word.) They grabbed 
this, as it was trailed past them, pulled hard 
upon it, and managed to restrain the kite be- 
fore it had left the edge of the slope very far. 
By hard work, they succeeded in pulling it back 
to the hill. Which and T’other clicking about, 
and, I am sorry to say, nicking off a finger or a 
toe here and there as they came. 

“My babes — my precious babes!” sobbed Mrs. 
Dolliver, when the box-kite was brought down 
and the two young heroes lifted from it. 

“Give ’em each a pop-over,” counselled Aunt 
Dinah, “an’ de nex’ time dey’ll fly more better.” 

147 


THE DOINGS OF THE DOLLIVERS 


Lunch was spread on Couch Ridge ; the picnic 
was eaten with great joy; and afterwards the 
box-kite was fastened to the spotted horse, and 
that noble animal — quite reconciled to it now — 
started in to drag it soberly home. Mrs. Dol- 
liver had got from her adventurous husband a 
promise that he would never again attempt to 
‘'flee as a bird,” or even as an aeronaut; and 
she had exacted a further pledge that she should 
have the flying machine to use for a chicken- 
house in the back yard. 

“There will be things in it then that can fly, 
anyhow, and maybe it will catch the trick it- 
self,” laughed Dolly Dolliver. 

The caravan was moving slowly along in the 
grandest manner. Which and T’other taking 
turns at putting the lead-pencils back under the 
box-kite as it rolled forward, Mr. Dolliver driv- 
ing the spotted horse. Tommy and Aunt Dinah 
shoving at the back of the box-kite, while Mrs. 
Dolliver and Dolly followed with the Japanese 
Prince, when they heard a rattling and looked 
148 


GOING UP! 

up to see the Bicycle Policeman coming toward 
them. 

Now this Bicycle Policeman was an individual 
with whom the Dollivers had, so far, had noth- 
ing to do, since they were law-abiding citizens 
of the nursery. He was split right down the 
profile, and half of him had dropped off; yet, 
when he was wound up, the bicycle would still 
go in the most marvellous manner, with only one 
leg moving about on the pedals. 

“Hi! — Hi! — Hi!” shouted this person as he 
approached the group. “You folks, there — I 
arrest you all. That ain’t the right thing you’re 
doing at all.” 

“Well, but can you arrest us for just not do- 
ing the right thing T’ argued Mr. Dolliver, 
leaning on his cane and surveying the police- 
man. 

“Yes, I can. I’m a policeman, ain’t I? 
Well, there’s no use being a policeman if 
you can’t arrest folks,” shouted the one-sided 


man. 


149 


THE DOINGS OF THE DOLLIVERS 


“What did you say we were arrested forT’ in- 
quired Dolly. 

“For exceeding the speed limit then/’ said the 
tin individual. Everybody laughed, and he 
looked round at them sulkily. 

“Well, I know you ain’t going very fast now;” 
he allowed. “But you went terrible fast in that 
auto the other day, and I couldn’t remember 
what it was you ought to be took up for, and so 
I didn’t arrest you then. I’m a-going to run you 
in now.” 

“You can’t,” said Tommy Dolliver. “At 
least,” as he heard the bicycle policeman be- 
ginning to creak, “you can’t arrest us for that, 
if you didn’t do it at the time.” 

“Then I’ll arrest you for flying without a li- 
cence. That’s a flying machine ain’t it^ You 
didn’t have any licence for flying, did you*?” 

“No,” put in the Japanese Prince unexpect- 
edly; “nor did we fly, either. Mr. Dolliver and 
his family tried this flying machine, but it was 
too heavily weighted and wouldn’t go up.” 

150 


GOING UP! 


‘‘Then I’ll arrest you for failing,” clattered 
the tin man triumphantly. “I tell you a police- 
man’s got to arrest somebody.” 

Dolly had been around on his other side and 
observed the hollow and empty condition of 
him. She now came up to her father whisper- 
ing and dimpling, and Mr. Dolliver, acting on 
her advice, spoke out sharply: 

“Are you prepared to hear both sides of the 
question?” he said, “are you now? Examine 
your own mind carefully — are you?” 

The tin policeman looked blank. 

“Blest if I know,” he said, rasping a hand 
across the hollow edges of his head evidently 
with the idea that he was scratching it. “I — 
Both sides, did you say, sir?” 

He shuffled around in the vain attempt to 
keep his good half turned to the entire party. 
He looked ingratiatingly at them out of his lit- 
tle painted eye. 

“What would you rather be arrested for?” he 


THE DOINGS OF THE DOLLIVERS 


asked them, and added under his breath, “Both 
sides — dear me! There’s a poser!” 

“He doesn’t know a thing about it,” whispered 
Dolly again. “Go ahead. Pa, talk right up to 
him.” 

“I insist upon being arrested!” shouted Mr. 
Dolliver, working himself into quite a fury- 
“You have threatened myself and my family 
with arrest — now do your worst.” 

“Oh, yes — that’s easy,” returned the tin 
policeman dolefully. “I always do my worst.. 
Now, if you’d ask me to do my best — ” He 
caught Dolly’s laughing glance and took heart. 
“What would you say. Miss, was the best thing 
for me to do^?” he asked. 

“Hire yourself out for a baking pan — you’d 
make a fine one,” counselled Dolly wickedly. 

The tin policeman creaked so loudly that it 
amounted to quite a shriek. 

“If I had my other half by me,” he blustered, 
“you wouldn’t dare speak that way. My other 
152 


GOING UP! 


half was very savage. You’d never have talked 
up to it — him — me, when I had it on. Wow! 
Let me alone, old woman ! What do you 
want?” 

For Aunt Dinah had stolen up and was run- 
ning a thick, black forefinger around the empty 
side of the policeman’s split head. 

“Now you dest hold still, honey,” the cook 
chuckled. “I only wants to see if yo’ haid’ll 
do to bake custard pies in. Come yeh. Miss 
Dolly. Look at dat. Dat be fine. Right in 
whar his brains ’d ’a’ been — if he’d had any.” 

But with a wild yell and rattle the Bicycle Po- 
liceman fled. 

“I have heard it said,” Mr. Dolliver remarked 
solemnly, as they proceeded on their way, “that 
all men have their good side and their bad side 

“But this person had only one side,” inter- 
rupted Mrs. Dolliver. “Which should you 
say it was?” 


153 


THE DOINGS OF THE DOLLIVERS 


“Ah — which?” sighed the head of the house, 
as he helped them put the box-kite in place in 
the back yard. 


154 





Aunt Dinah and Dolly. 



XVII 


MRS. DOLLIVER CLEANS HOUSE 

Mrs. Dolliver always said, when any question 
of housekeeping came up, that she would be a 
very active person in such matters if the baby 
were not sewed into her arm. 

The paper doll came over one evening and 
read a number of jokes such as you have often 
seen in the papers, about the discomfort of 
house-cleaning. The Dolliver family laughed a 
good deal about the gentlemen who ate their 
meals from the mantel, or sitting on an over- 
turned scrub-pail or step-ladder. Mr. Dolliver 
was particularly delighted with the story of a 
man who got soot all over him and burned his 
fingers when he was forced to take down the 
stove-pipe. 

“We have an advantage there,’’ he said. 

155 


THE DOINGS OF THE DOLLIVERS 


‘‘There is no pipe to our stove. And even should 
Mrs. Dolliver behave in this curious manner — 
which I can’t imagine for a moment — she would 
have to devise something else for me to do.” 

“If the baby were not sewed in my arm,” said 
Mrs. Dolliver, thoughtfully, “I don’t know but 
I should get to cleaning house and such things. 
I feel it coming on sometimes — and then there’s 
the baby.” 

Mr. Dolliver chuckled, and the family agreed 
that they were very glad the baby was there. 

Then came a day when Ethel decided that 
Mrs. Dolliver’s dress was soiled — and indeed all 
the garments she had on — and that they 
must be washed. She brought her little scis- 
sors and snipped away the threads that held the 
baby, laid him tenderly in the crib, which he 
had never been able to occupy before, then un- 
dressed the good lady entirely, put on the only 
other garment Mrs. Dolliver had — a night- 
gown — placed her in her bed, and with Nurse 
Anna’s assistance washed and ironed Mrs. Dol- 
156 


MRS. DOLLIVER CLEANS HOUSE 


liver’s blue and white striped dress, as well as 
all her undergarments. 

It was late when the little frock, the petti- 
coats and things were done, and Ethel hastily 
slipped them on her, pinned them in place, and 
set the lady down before her bureau, bidding 
her: 

“Comb your hair, Mrs. Dolliver, and do it up 
nicely.” 

Ethel was rather weary and sleepy. 

“I’ll sew the baby back to-morrow,” she said, 
yawning. “Maybe I might leave him out a 
while. I’m tired of seeing Mrs. Dolliver always 
have him.” 

“Oh, but not half as tired as I am!” groaned 
Mrs. Dolliver. 

Ethel did not hear this however. She went 
on, speaking to herself: 

“Its papa ought to nurse it sometimes, I 
think — What’s that?” for Mr. Dolliver had 
fallen suddenly — whack — out of the chair, 
where she had placed him. “Mr. Dolliver, you 

157 


THE DOINGS OF THE DOLLIVERS 


act just as if you heard me, and didn’t want to 
do it,” the little girl said, severely. “Now I’m 
going to take your son out of the crib and put 
him in your arms, and you can just keep him all 
night. We’ll pretend he’s got colic, and that 
you have to walk up and down the floor with 
him — oh, poor fellow ! I forgot you were lame. 
Well, you can sit in this chair and hold him, 
then.” 

Nurse Anna was insisting that it was high 
time Ethel was in bed, and the little girl turned 
reluctantly and left the Dolliver family to 
themselves. For a few moments the house was 
silent, as Mrs. Dolliver said, “From garret to 
cellar.” Then that lady left off passing the 
comb over her black china hair, turned to Mr. 
Dolliver and spoke, in a quiet, ordinary voice, 
but one which to that gentleman — as he after- 
wards declared — sounded much louder than any 
trumpet blast, and much more alarming : 

“I’m going to clean house.” 

Mr. Dolliver groaned so suddenly and so 
158 


MRS. DOLLIVER CLEANS HOUSE 


loudly that he waked the baby. The child set 
up a most terrific screaming, but for once in her 
life Mrs. Dolliver never turned her head at the 
sound; she simply switched down the stairs, 
making the skirts of her freshly-starched dress 
rattle as she went. 

Now I don’t want you to tell anybody, because 
it was an awful thing for him to do, but as soon 
as it began to hush, Mr. Dolliver pinched the 
baby. It emitted five or six of the most terrible 
whistling yells you can imagine ; but Mrs. Dol- 
liver only came to the foot of the stairs and 
called up: 

'‘Mr. Dolliver, ’tend to that child. Don’t you 
hear it crying? Queen Ethel said it had colic. 
Give it something.” 

Didn’t he hear it crying? Give it something! 
How the terrible virus of house-cleaning will 
change the sweetest nature ! Mr. Dolliver 
looked at the baby and wished he had not 
pinched so hard. (It was a very nice little hol- 
low rubber baby, with blue eyes, pink cheeks, 

159 


THE DOINGS OF THE DOLLIVERS 


and an extra strong squeaker in the small of 
its back, which, when you pinched or pounded 
the infant, screamed wildly.) 

“I don’t know what to give it,” he called back 
weakly. 

But Mrs. Dolliver was gone. She was at the 
range making a tremendous clatter and explain- 
ing to Aunt Dinah that they had that house to 
clean from garret to cellar — and that they must 
get it done in one day (that’s one night, you 
know), because Queen Ethel was liable to sew 
the baby back into her arm to-morrow. 

“And if he screams like that — if he gets in 
the habit of it, I mean — I shall never have an- 
other opportunity to clean house. I wonder if 
Mr. Dolliver has given him anything?” mur- 
mured the mother, as she poured great thimble- 
fuls of water into the range boiler. 

Upstairs, Which and T’other had been at- 
tracted by the noise — a racket always drew the 
twins as surely as sugar draws flies. 

“Ma said to give him something,” Which 
160 


MRS. DOLLIVER CLEANS HOUSE 


prompted, standing with his feet very wide 
apart, regarding the unhappy Mr. Dolliver and 
the yelling baby. (Mr. Dolliver, in his con- 
fusion, was tossing it about, flinging it from one 
arm to the other, ejaculating, “There — there!’' 
and at every jerk and every bounce, it gave an- 
other keen shriek.) 

“If I was you. Pa, I’d give him fits,” supplied 
T’other, who never meant to be left out of any 
conversation very long. 

“He — he seems to be crying,” said Mr. Dol- 
liver, looking from one twin to the other. 

''SeemsT snickered Which. “How do you 
reckon it would sound if he really was crying?” 

“There — there!” exclaimed Mr. Dolliver 
gratefully, “if you little boys want to take care 
of your infant brother, I shall not object. 
Your Mother is cleaning house.” 

“Whoop!” said Which. 

And “Whoop!” echoed T’other. 

“Give us the kid!” they cried together. “If 
Ma’s going to clean house, le’s us clean the 
i6i 


THE DOINGS OF THE DOLLIVERS 


baby!’’ And they whirled away with the de- 
voted infant, Mr. Dolliver looking after them 
with some concern, and listening for quite a 
while, timidly, to the strange sounds which 
came back from the bath-room. 

In the kitchen, Mrs. Dolliver had found the 
warm support which the female servant almost 
always gives to her mistress in times of domestic 
battle, upheaval and revolution. 

‘‘Ain’t never got to clean dis hyer house since 
I’m been livin’ in it,” Aunt Dinah chuckled glee- 
fully. “I reckon you and me’ll dest make dis 
hyer place look like a new penny ’fore we gits 
done.” 

“Oh, no,” said Mrs. Dolliver, thoughtfully 
stirring a bar of china soap into the boiler of hot 
water. “I do not want the house to look at all 
like a penny; it would be much too small for 
the family. A penny is round, you know, and 
flat, and has an eagle on one side, with an Indian 
on the other; I don’t think a house ought to look 
like a penny.” 


162 


MRS. DOLLIVER CLEANS HOUSE 


“What you g’wine do ’bout Marse Tommy’s 
clo’s?” inquired Aunt Dinah, bracing her hands 
upon her hips. “Dey won’t come off ; reckon he 
’bleege to be washed in ’em.” 

“We can put him in a tub of soapsuds, all 
right,” said Mrs. Dolliver gravely. “And if he 
helps a little we can even rub him up and down 
on the board; but I’m afraid it might hurt him to 
put him through the wringer. Do you think it 
would do to boil him at all*?” 

A sudden shriek from Tommy, who had been 
summoned to the conference, recorded his objec- 
tion to being boiled. Aunt Dinah, with a leap 
of astonishing quickness and limberness, con- 
sidering her, age and her bulk, stopped him at the 
door. 

“Come back, honey,” she coaxed. “Yo’ Ma 
an’ me ain’t gwine to hurt ye. We gwine make 
you look like a little genterman. We cleanin’ 
house, we is, an’ you ’bleeged to go in de tub 
along wid yo’ clo’s, ’ca’se dem clo’s is sewed 
fast.” 


163 


THE DOINGS OF THE DOLLIVERS 


Tommy still cast apprehensive glances at the 
boiler; but the two women finally got him into 
the tub by promising solemnly that he should 
not be boiled. 

“Unless he comes out very streaky, you 
know,” whispered Mrs. Dolliver to Aunt Dinah. 
“In that case we might have to use a little boil- 
ing water; but we could just pour it on him, if 
he objects to the boiler itself.” 

The washing of Tommy Dolliver’s suit with 
Tommy Dolliver inside of it made such a dis- 
turbance that it drew the whole Dolliver family 
to the kitchen. If you want to realise some- 
thing of how it would be, just fancy Mamma 
and the laundress putting you in a tub with 
your white pique suit on, and asking you to 
scrub the wrists and the elbows up and down on 
the wash-board. Which and T’other were glad 
then that their dresses were red and did not 
show the dirt — though it was great fun to 
watch Tommy going through. But the elder 
boy’s worst discomfort came from the fact that 
164 


MRS. DOLLIVER CLEANS HOUSE 


his white pique cap was sewed firmly to his 
hair, and his head had to be pushed under again 
and again to get the cap thoroughly rubbed and 
rinsed. 

When the suit seemed to be entirely clean, and 
Tommy was half drowned. Aunt Dinah stood 
him on the kitchen table, and the two debated 
how they should set about wringing the clothes. 

“You take his head and twist one way, and 
ril take his heels and twist de udder way — 
dat’ll wring de water out,” suggested Dinah 
cheerfully. 

The attempt seemed so much more likely to 
wring the life out of Tommy, and he kicked and 
howled so vigorously, that it was promptly 
given up, though Which and T’other believed 
it to be a good plan, and immediately scuttled 
upstairs to try it on the baby, who could be 
heard whistling and squealing in the bath-room. 

Tommy was now placed upright, and the wash- 
ers began squeezing his arms and legs to get the 
water out. Sure that his troubles were almost 

165 


THE DOINGS OF THE DOLLIVERS 


over, he bore it like a hero, only shouting occa- 
sionally, “Whoop! Ooo — wow! You tickle — 
you tickle!” But when they were done with this, 
Dinah produced a basket of clothespins — each 
one about as long as her arm — put up a line in 
the yard, and she and Mrs. Dolliver hung the 
unfortunate boy up by the shoulders, and left 
him to dry while they sought for more cleaning 
to do. 

The Japanese Prince, who lived over on a 
bracket, had become an almost constant visitor at 
the Dolliver house, and when but on this day 
of all days should he elect to come calling! 
Dolly Dolliver was leaning out of a window — 
they had taken away her wash dress, and she 
had on her pink silk. The Prince stopped below 
to pay her some beautiful Japanese compliments 
on her appearance. Dolly waited politely, very 
much pleased, until he was done, and then ex- 
claimed : 

“We’re house-cleaning — or at least mother is.” 

“House-cleaning!” echoed the prince. “Is that 
166 


MRS. DOLLIVER CLEANS HOUSE 


one of the customs of the country? If so, I 
should greatly like to observe it.” 

The prince said he was going to write a book 
about America for all Japanese dolls to read, 
and he was particularly anxious to observe any- 
thing distinctively American. 

‘‘Yes,” said Dolly, “house-cleaning is one of 
the customs of the country. But I don’t think 
— I really do not think, Your Highness — that 
you will enjoy observing it one bit. In the first 
place, mamma is in a very curious state of mind 
— she is indeed. She won’t let you stand by and 
look on. She’ll have you cleaning something, or 
being cleaned, before you know what you’re 
about. Look at Tommy — he’s just through it.” 

The Japanese gentleman turned his gaze to 
where poor Tommy Dolliver hung by the shoul- 
ders from the clothesline, flapping and dangling 
in a brisk breeze that had sprung up. 

“She is insane,” he whispered. “Perhaps that 
it one of the customs of the country, too; but I 
think I would better go home.” 

167 


THE DOINGS OF THE DOLLIVERS 


“All women are more or less insane on the 
subject of house-cleaning,” said Dolly, wisely. 
“The paper doll read that out of a book the 
other day. This insanity takes the form of wash- 
ing anything washable. Your kimono is plainly 
not sewed fast, and mamma would have it in the 
tub before you could say Jack Robinson.” 

“I do not wish to say Jack Robinson,” said 
the Japanese Prince soberly. “I am not ac- 
quainted with any person by that name. But if 
my kimono is not sewed on, it is pasted on. 
And — lean a little closer down. Miss Dolly, and 
ril whisper — it’s paper! Few people can tell it 
from the richest brocade; but the — er — the ten- 
cent kind all have paper kimonos, and I was” — 
he looked in her face anxiously, gave a little 
gulp, and hurried on — “I have long wanted to 
tell you honestly and frankly. I will now: I 
am only the ten-cent sort. I was but a favour at 
a children’s party. Dear Miss Dolly, I’m living 
it down. However obscure my origin, I have led 
an honest life here in this nursery for weeks. I 
168 


MRS. DOLLIVER CLEANS HOUSE 


had hoped that the day might come — when — 
but no matter.” 

For Mrs. Dolliver had opened the door, and 
was casting what seemed to the prince greedy 
eyes at his gaily-flowered garments. With a 
pleading look at Dolly — which was kindly re- 
ceived — he turned and fled, and the lady of the 
house was only restrained from pursuing by a 
tremendous clatter and sousing, and then the 
soft swash of water coming down the stairs. 
The twins had overturned the bath-tub ! 

Mrs. Dolliver said afterward that she had no 
idea in the world how she reached the upper 
floor of her house. 

“By the stairs, by the stairs, my dear, quite in 
the usual way,” said Mr. Dolliver testily. 

She found the baby lying rigid on the bath- 
room floor, while Which and T’other scoured 
the windows and woodwork with its garments, 
which they had sopped in the overturned bath- 
tub. 

“We’ll wipe the stairs in a minute, ma,” 
169 


THE DOINGS OF THE DOLLIVERS 

squealed Which. ‘‘Aren’t we just the finest 
house-cleaners ever?” 

“Which said you wouldn’t mind our using the 
baby’s clothes for mop rags,” T’other put in. 
“We’ll wash ’em afterwards. We’ve already 
washed him — that’s when you heard him holler, 
‘Ah, yeep — ah, yeep — ah, yoop, ah!’ We took 
some sand, and part of his complexion came off 
— but he’s got enough left.” 

With a loud shriek, Mrs. Dolliver cast herself 
down beside her offspring. 

“I hear no sound; I see no movement; he is 
dead !” she moaned. 

“Oh, no,” said Which amiably. “He’s kicked 
and fought till he’s tired, and we turned him 
over so he could rest. We plugged up his 
squeaker — that’s why he doesn’t yell.” 

Mrs. Dolliver gathered her abused infant to 
her bosom. She looked up with streaming eyes. 
Mr. Dolliver, tall and gloomy, (at least he was 
very gloomy indeed, and he tried to be as tall as 
170 


MRS. DOLLIVER CLEANS HOUSE 


he could) stood leaning on his cane and looking 
at her. 

“Miserable woman!” he said in a hollow tone. 
“There are the fruits of your mad rage for 
house-cleaning. A murdered infant, a wretched 
family, contaminated offspring — for Which and 
T’other are no better than murderers — a son who 
is hung (it’s on a line to dry, but I’m going to 
make it as bad as I can while I’m about it) — 
a son who has been hung, a daughter whose 
honest suitor you have driven from your door! 
Look upon the ruin you have wrought — and 
r-r-reform!” 

“I will— I will!” sobbed Mrs. Dolliver. “If 
only Queen Ethel will sew this poor lamb back 
into my arm, I shall not be tempted again. 
Which, take those clothes right down to Aunt 
Dinah, and let her rinse them out. T’other, tell 
her to give you the mop, and bring it up here and 
dry this floor.” 

The riot was at its maddest; the Japanese 
171 


THE DOINGS OF THE DOLLIVERS 


Prince running as for his life; Which and 
T’other scrambling madly down-stairs to obey 
their mother; Mrs. Dolliver sobbing loudly over 
her half-murdered infant, which, the squeaker 
having been unplugged, was once more yelling 
shrilly; Tommy howling out in the yard, while 
Aunt Dinah and Dolly tried to take him down 
from the line; the three pigs, the Indians, the 
crumply-horned cow, the spotted horse, and every 
other creature on the premised running about 
screaming, or howling or grunting with terror at 
these strange doings in the usually quiet Dolli- 
ver household — when they all heard a soft little 
exclamation from the doorway. 

There was perfect silence. Everybody turned 
and looked. There stood Ethel in her white 
nightgown, her soft feet bare, her curls tangled 
about her shoulders, and the sleep still in her 
eyes. 

‘Dh, you dear things! Can you really talk 
and run about like this? Why do you never 
do it when I’m with you?” 

172 


MRS. DOLLIVER CLEANS HOUSE 

Instantly every doll and toy fell flat and lay 
where it had fallen — that is the rule in toyland, 
and the Dollivers were too good people to break 
rules. 

Queen Ethel stood looking at them, disap- 
pointed and a little bewildered and doubtful, 
when Nurse came hurrying in from the night 
nursery with a tiny lamp in her hand, though 
the moonlight made it unnecessary. Finding 
Ethel among the scattered toys, she began one 
of her comfortable, mild scoldings. 

“But they were talking, and running about — 
oh, so cunning, Nursey dear!” Ethel explained, 
clinging to Anna’s hand, as that practical per- 
son picked up Mr. and Mrs. Dolliver to drop 
them head-first on their kitchen floor. 

“Oh, don’t, Nursey — don’t do that! You’ll 
offend them. They can walk there if they want 
to go. I saw them just now, and heard them 
having a great fuss of some sort. And just look 
— see what a mess they’ve got everything in. 
They did it all themselves, every bit of it.” 

173 


THE DOINGS OF THE DOLLIVERS 


“Nonsense,” said Anna, laughing and kissing 
her little charge. “Nursey’s girl has been 
dreaming. Come back to bed, honey child.” 

But Ethel knows better than that, and she is 
always planning to surprise them again some 
time in the night, and get a better view of the 
wonderful doings of the Dollivers. 


THE END 


174 


JACQUELINE OF THE CARRIER 
PIGEONS 

A Story of the Siege of Leyden 

By AUGUSTA HUIELL SEAMAN 

With an IntroducMon by 
WILLIAM ELLIOT GRIFFIS, D.D., L.H D. 

Decorative Drawings, Cover Designs, and Decorative Title-page 
by George Wharton Edwards 

Cloth 12mo. $1.25 net 


Stories abounding in romantic and stirring adventures centering 
about historical events are stories that unfailingly delight young people, 
and Jacqueline of the Carrier Pigeons is a tale of this kind. It is a 
story of the historic siege of Leyden, in which the young heroine and 
her brave and ready-witted brother, an actual boy of whom history 
gives a glimpse, play a not insignificant part. The raising of the 
siege of Leyden — the breaking of the dikes, the sailing of the great 
Dutch men-of-war over the flooded meadows, the flight of the be- 
sieging Spaniards, the rejoicings of the half-starved townsmen — will 
be forever imprinted upon the minds of young people by this graphic, 
simple, and moving narrative. 

The engaging heroine and the daring young hero are sure to stand 
high in the good graces of youthful reaciers, and the swift movement, 
the dramatic turns and surprises of the tale are sure to hold all under 
their spell. It is an absorbing blend of true history and romance. 

The cover design, title page, and decorative drawings are all by 
George Wharton Edwards, an accomplished artist, peculiarly s)rmpa- 
thetic with his subject, who knows Holland intimately — its people, the 
face of the country, and its history. The illustrations from his designs 
charmingly embellish the book, and make it a most attractive volume 
for young readers. 


STURGIS & WALTON COMPANY 

31-33 East 27TH St., New York. 


AN OUT-OF-DOOR DIARY FOR 
BOYS AND GIRLS 

A Nature Note-Book for Young People 

Illustrated and Arranged by 
MARION MILLER 

Cloth Small Quarto Illustrations in Color $1.25 net 


A note-book designed as a pleasant incentive to the direct observa- 
tion of nature, this little volume is adapted to boys and girls and 
suitable even for little children. Teachers of nature classes will find 
it a very real assistance in their work. It is of a size easily carried, 
and invites the attention of young people by the pictures, appropriate 
to the changing months, pictures at the head of each page in color and 
in black-and-white, with which it is profusely illustrated. Under the 
illustrations at the tops of the pages which suggest times and places 
for the jotting down of notes are blank pages for such juvenile jot- 
tings. 

This little book has no system to teach; puts forth no scientific 
method; and requires no key. It is simply an attractive lure to draw 
young eyes to nature observations, to provide them with a book in 
which to record them, and to awaken the young imagination by the 
pictures, the mottoes, and the verses, with a view to making nature 
study a delightful pastime and not a tiresome task. 


STURGIS & WALTON COMPANY, 
31-33 East 27TH St., New York. 






































One copy del. to Cat. Div. 
DEC 3 1910 



